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ARISTOCRACY  AND    EVOLUTION 


BY  SAME  AUTHOR. 

LABOUR  AND    THE   POPULAR  WELFARE. 

Tenth  Thousand. 

Crown  8vo.     Cloth.    Price  90  cts, 

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NEW  YORK:   THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY, 
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ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

A   STUDY   OF   THE   RIGHTS,  THE   ORIGIN. 

AND   THE    SOCIAL   FUNCTIONS   OF 

THE  WEALTHIER   CLASSES 

BY 

W.   H.   MALLOCK 

AUTHOR   OF   'is   life   WORTH    LIVING?'    'a   HUMAN   DOCUMBNT,' 
'  UVBOUR   AND  THE    POPULAR   WELFARE,'    ETC. 


Toute  civilisation  est  I'cEuvre  des  aristocrates. 

Kenan. 
'Tis  thus  the  spirit  of  a  single  mind 

Makes  that  of  multitudes  take  one  direction, 
As  roll  the  waters  to  the  breathing  wind, 

Or  roams  the  herd  beneath  the  bull's  protection. 
Or  as  a  little  dog  will  lead  the  blind, 

Or  a  bell-wether  form  the  flock's  connection 
By  tinkling  sounds,  when  they  go  forth  to  victual, 
Such  is  the  sway  of  your  great  men  o'er  little. 

There  was  not  now  a  liiggace-boy  but  sought 

Danger  and  spoil  with  ardour  much  increased; 
And  why .'     Because  a  little  —  odd  —  old  man, 
Stript  to  his  shirt,  was  come  to  lead  the  van. 

BVRON. 


THE    MACMILLAN    COMPANY 

LONDON:  MACMILLAN  &  CO.,  Ltd. 
1898 

All  right!  reserved 


Copyright,  1898, 
By  the  MACMILLAN  COMPANY. 


NorirooB  ^ttBS 

J.  S.  Cufhing  k  Co.  —  Berwick  &  Smith 

Norwood  Mats.  U.S.A.. 


1+1 

60  b.  I 


PREFACE 

The  word  aristocracy  as  used  in  the  title  of  this 
volume  has  no  exclusive,  and  indeed  no  special, 
reference  to  a  class  distinguished  by  hereditary- 
political  privileges,  by  titles,  or  by  heraldic  pedigree. 
It  here  means  the  exceptionally  gifted  and  efficient 
minority,  no  matter  what  the  position  in  which  its 
members  may  have  been  born,  or  what  the  sphere 
of  social  progress  in  which  their  exceptional  effi- 
ciency shows  itself.  I  have  chosen  the  word 
aristocracy  in  preference  to  the  word  oligarchy 
because  it  means  not  only  the  rule  of  the  few, 
but  of  the  best  or  the  most  efficient  of  the  few. 

Of  the  various  questions  involved  in  the  general 
argument  of  the  work,  many  would,  if  they  were 
to  be  examined  exhaustively,  demand  entire  treat- 
ises to  themselves  rather  than  chapters.  This  is 
specially  true  of  such  questions  as  the  nature  of 
men's  congenital  inequalities,  the  effects  of  different 
classes  of  motive  in  producing  different  classes  of 
action,  and  the  effects  of  equal  education  on  un- 
equal talents  and  temperaments.  But  the  practical 
bearings  of  an  argument  are  more  readily  grasped 


vi  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

when  its  various  parts  are  set  forth  with  com- 
parative brevity,  than  they  are  when  the  attention 
claimed  for  each  is  minute  enough  to  do  it  justice 
as  a  separate  subject  of  inquiry ;  and  it  has 
appeared  to  me  that  in  the  present  condition  of 
opinion,  prevalent  social  fallacies  may  be  more 
easily  combated  by  putting  the  case  against  them 
in  a  form  which  will  render  it  intelligible  to  every- 
body, and  by  leaving  many  points  to  be  elaborated, 
if  necessary,  elsewhere. 

I  may  also  add  that  the  conclusions  here  arrived 
at,  with  whatever  completeness  they  might  have 
explained,  elaborated,  and  defended,  would  not, 
in  my  opinion,  do  more  than  partially  answer 
the  questions  to  which  they  refer.  This  volume 
aims  only  at  establishing  what  are  the  social  rights 
and  social  functions,  in  progressive  communities, 
of  the  few.  The  entire  question  of  their  duties 
and  proper  liabilities,  whether  imposed  on  them  by 
themselves  or  by  the  State,  has  been  left  untouched. 
This  side  of  the  question  I  hope  to  deal  with  here- 
after. It  is  enough  to  observe  here  that  it  is 
impossible  to  define  the  duties  of  the  few,  of  the 
rich,  of  the  powerful,  of  the  highly  gifted,  and  to 
secure  that  these  duties  shall  be  performed  by 
them,  unless  we  first  understand  the  extent  of  the 
functions  which  they  inevitably  perform,  and  admit 
frankly  the  indefeasible  character  of  their  rights. 


CONTENTS 

BOOK   I 

CHAPTER   I       '' 

The  Fundamental  Error  in  Modern  Sociological  Study 


PACK 


Science  during  the  middle  of  this  century  excited  popular  interest  mainly 

on  account  of  its  bearing  on  the  doctrines  of  Christianity  .         .         3 

Its  popularity  is  now  beginning  to  depend  on  its  bearing  not  on  religious 

problems,  but  on  social     .........         3 

Science  itself  is  undergoing  a  corresponding  change        ....        4 

Its  characteristic  aim  during  the  middle  of  the  century  was  to  deal  with 

physical  and  physiological  evolution 4 

Its  characteristic  aim  now  is  to  deal  with  the  evolution  of  society    .        .        5 
Social  science  itself  is  not  wholly  new     .......         5 

What  is  new  is  the  application  to  it  of  the  evolutionary  theory         .         ,         6 
This  excites  men  by  suggesting  great  social  changes  in  the  future,  .         .         7 
which  will  give  a  speculative  meaning  to  the  history  of  humanity,  .         .         8 
or  secure  for  men  now  existing,  or  for  their  children,  practical  social  ad- 
vantages   8 

Men  have  thus  a  double  reason  for  being  interested  in  social  science, 

and  sociologists  a  doul^  reason  for  studying  it;        .         .         .         .         9 
and  it  has  attracted  a  number  of  men  of  genius,  who  have  applied  to  it 

methods  learned  in  the  schoOT  of  physical  science     ....         9 
Yet  despite  their  genius  and  their  diligence,  all  parties  complain  that  the 

results  of  their  study  are  inconclusive        .         .      ^P       ...       10 
Professor  Marshall  and  Mr.  Kidd,  for  instance,  complain  of  the  fact,  but 

can  suggest  no  explanation  of  it        . lo 

What  can  the  explanation  be? 11 

vii 


vm 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


The  answer  will  be  found  in  the  fact  just  referred  to — that  social  science 

attempts  to  answer  two  distinct  sets  of  questions;      .         .         .         .12 

and  one  set  —  namely,  the  speculative  —  it  has  answered  with  great 

success; 12 

it  has  failed  only  in  attempting  to  answer  practical  questions  .        .         .13 

Now  the  phenomena  with  which  it  has  dealt  successfully  are  phenomena 

of  social  aggregates,  considered  as  wholes; 13 

but  the  practical  problems  of  to-day,  with  which  it  has  dealt  unsuccess- 
fully, arise  out  of  the  conflict  between  different  parts  of  aggregates  .       15 

Social  science  has  failed  as  a  practical  guide  because  it  has  not  recog- 
nised this  distinction;       .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .16 

and  hence  arise  most  of  the  errors  of  the  political  philosophy  of  this  cen- 
tury   16 


CHAPTER   II 


The  Attempt  to  merge  the  Great  Man  in  the 
Aggregate 

Whatever  may  be  done  by  some  men,  or  classes  of  men,  sociologists  are 
at  present  accustomed  to  attribute  to  tnan        .... 

Mr.  Kidd's  Social  Evolution,  for  instance,  is  based  entirely  on  this  pro 
cedure      

He  quotes  with  approval  two  other  writers  who  have  been  guilty  of  it; 

who  both  attribute  to  man  what  is  done  by  only  a  few  men;  . 

and  the  consequences  of  their  reasoning  are  ludicrous     . 

Mr.  Kidd's  reasoning  itself  is  not  less  ludicrous.  The  first  half  of  his 
argument  is  that  religion  prompts  the  few  to  surrender  advantages 
to  the  many,  which,  if  they  chose  to  do  so,  they  could  keep     . 

The  second  half  is  that  the  many  could  have  taken  these  advantages 
from  the  few,  and  that  religion  alone  prevented  them  from  doing 
so 

This  contradiction  is  entirely  due  to  the  faA  that,  having  first  divided 
the  social  aggregate  into  two  classes,  he  then  obliterates  his  division, 
and  thinks  of  tha^both  as  "  man  " 

Mr.  Kidd's  confusion  ^^he  result  of  no  accidental  error.  It  is  the  inev 
itable  result  of  a  radically  fallacious  method ;    .         .         .         , 

and  of  this  method  the  chief  exponent  is  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer, 

as  a  short  summary  of  his  arguments  will  show        .... 


17 

17 
18 

20 


24 
25 


CONTENTS  ix 


PAGB 


Mr.   Spencer  starts  with  saying  that  the   chief  impediment  to  social 

science  is  the  great-man  theory; 25 

for,  if  the  appearance  of  the  great  man  is  incalculable,  progress,  if  it  de- 
pends on  him,  must  be  incalculable  also;  26 

but  if  the  great  man  is  not  a  miraculous  apparition,  he  owes  his  great- 
ness to  causes  outside  himself;  .......       27 

and  it  is  these  causes  which  really  produce  the  effects  of  which  he  is  the 

proximate  initiator    ..........       27 

These  effects,  therefore,  are  to  be  explained  by  reference  not  to  the  great 

man,  but  to  the  causes  that  are  behind  the  great  man       ...       28 
The  true  causes,  says  Mr.  Spencer,  of  all  social  phenomena  are  physical 

environment  and  men's  natural  character 29 

The  first  physical  cause  of  progress  was  an  exceptionally  fertile  soil        .       29 

and  an  exceptionally  bracing  climate 29 

All  the  conquering  races  came  from  fertile  and  bracing  regions       .         .       30 
There  were  other  regions  more  fertile,  but  these  were  enervating;  and 
hence  the  inhabitants  of  the  former  enslaved  the  weaker  inhabitants 

of  the  latter 30 

Again,  division  of  labour,  on  which  industrial  progress  depends,  was 

caused  by  difference  in  the  products  of  different  localities,        .         .       31 
which  led  to  the  localisation  of  industries         ......       32 

The  localisation  of  industries  in  its  turn  led  to  road-making;  ...  33 
and  roads  made  possible  the  centralisation  of  authority  and  interchange 

of  ideas 33 

Next,  as  to  men's  natural  character,  which  is  the  other  cause  of  prog- 
ress,          33 

their  primitive  character  did  not  fit  them  to  progress,  ....  34 
till  it  was  gradually  improved  by  the  evolution  of  marriage  and  the 

family  —  especially  of  monogamy 34 

Monogamy  represents  the  survival  of  the  fittest  kind  of  sexual  union  .  35 
It  developed  the  affections  and  the  practice  of  efficient  co-operation  .  35 
The  family  being  established,  the  nation  gradually  rose  from  it  .  -36 
One  family  increased,  and  gave  rise  to  many  families,  which  were  obliged, 

in  order  to  get  food,  to  separate  into  different  groups;      ...       36 
and  the  recompounding  of  these  groups,  for  purposes  of  defence  or 

aggression,  formed  the  nation;        . 37 

all  government  being  in  its  origin  military 37 

But  as  the  arts  of  life  progress,  industry  emancipates  itself  from  govern- 
mental control,  and  becomes  its  own  master,  and  also  forms  the 
basis  of  political  democracy 37 


X  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

PAGE 

Now,  if  we  consider  all  these  conclusions  of  Mr.  Spencer's,     •        •        .      39 

we  shall  find  them  to  be  all  conclusions  about  aggregates  as  wholes,  not 

about  parts  of  aggregates 39 

The  only  differences  recognised  by  him  between  men  are  differences  be- 
tween one  homogeneous  aggregate  and  another,       ....       40 

and  differences  between  similar  men  who  happen  to  be  occupied  dif- 
ferently     41 

But,  as  has  already  been  said,  the  social  problems  of  to-day  arise  out  of 
a  conflict  between  different  parts  of  the  same  aggregate;  therefore 
the  phenomena  of  the  aggregate  as  a  whole  do  not  help  us      .        -42 

The  conflict  between  the  parts  of  the  aggregate  arises  from  inequalities 

of  position        ...........       43 

of  which  Mr.  Spencer's  sociology  takes  no  account  ....       44 

Social  problems  arise  out  of  the  desire  of  those  whose  positions  are  in- 
ferior to  have  their  positions  changed;      ......       45 

and  the  practical  question  is,  is  the  change  they  desire  possible?     .         .       45 

To  answer  this  question  we  must  examine  into  the  causes  why  such  and 

such  individuals  are  in  inferior,  and  others  in  superior  positions        .       46 

Are  inequalities  in  position  due  to  alterable  and  accidental  circum- 
stances?   47 

Or  are  they  due  to  congenital  inequalities  which  no  one  can  ever  do 

away  with?       ...........       47 

Social  inequalities  are  partly  due  to  circumstances;  ....       48 

but  most  people  will  admit  that  congenital  inequalities  in  talent  have 

much  to  do  with  them 48 

Why  then  insist  on  this  fact? 49 

Because  this  fact  is  precisely  what  our  contemporary  sociologists  ignore,      49 

as  Mr.  Spencer  shows  us  by  his  distinct  admissions  and  assertions,  as 

well  as  by  the  character  of  his  conclusions 50 

His  condemnation  of  the  great-man  theory  is  a  removal  of  all  congenital 

inequalities  from  his  field  of  study;  .         .         .         .         .         .         -5^ 

and  he  actually  defines  an  aggregate  as  being  composed  of  approxi- 
mately equal  units 52 

His  failure  and  that  of  others,  as  practical  sociologists,  arises  from  their 

building  on  this  false  hypothesis 53 


CONTENTS  3d 

CHAPTER   III 

Great  Men,  as  the  true  Cause  of  Progress 

PAGB 

The  ignoring  of  natural  inequalities  is  a  deliberate  procedure.     Let  us 

see  how  it  is  defended 55 

Let  us  examine  Mr.  Spencer's  defence  of  it 55 

He  defends  it  in  two  ways  ; 55 

(i)  by  saying  that  the  great  man  does  not  really  do  what  he  seems 

to  do; 55 

(2)  by  saying  that  what  he  seems  to  do  is  not  really  much     ...  56 

He  admits  that  the  great  man  does  do  something  exceptional  in  war;  .  57 
but  denies  that  he  does  anything  exceptional  in  the  sphere  of  peaceful 

progress 57 

But  how  does  the  great  man  fulfil  his  function  in  war?    By  ordering 

others 58 

The  great  man,  in  peace,  does  precisely  the  same  thing  ....  59 
Mr.  Spencer,  for  example,  orders  the  compositors  who  put  his  books 

into  type 59 

The   inventor   orders   the   men  by  whom   his  inventions   are   manu- 
factured    60 

The  great  man  of  business  orders  his  employees 61 

The  hotel-keeper  orders  his  staff 62 

All  these   men  resemble  the  great   military  commander;    and  if  the 

latter  is  a  social  cause,  so  are  the  former 63 

Next,  as  to  the  contention  that  the  great  man  is  the  proximate  cause 

only,  and  not  the  true  cause  — 63 

This,  as  Mr.  Spencer  and  those  popular  writers  of  to-day  show  us,          .  64 

resolves  itself  into  four  arguments : 65 

(1)  That  every  first  discovery  involves  all  that  have  gone  before  it;         .  66 

(2)  that  the  discoverer's  ability  itself  is  the  product  of  past  circum- 
stances;    66 

(3)  that  often  the  same  discovery  is  made  by  several  men  at  once;         .  66 

(4)  that  the  difference  between   the  great  and  the  ordinary  man  is 
slight 66 

Simultaneous  discovery  only  shows  that  several  great  men,  instead  of 

one,  are  greater  than  others 67 

The  extent  of  the  great  man's  superiority  depends  on  how  it  is  meas- 
ured          68 


xii  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


PAGE 


It  may  be  slight  to  the  speculative  philosopher,  but  to  the  practical  man 

it  is  all-important     ..........       69 

As  for  the  two  other  arguments,  which  admit  the  great  man's  greatness, 

but  deny  that  it  is  his  own 71 

they  are  both  true  speculatively,  but  are  practically  untrue,  or  irrele- 
vant;         71 

just  as  statements  of  averages  and  classification  of  goods  may  be  true 

and  relevant  for  one  purpose,  and  false  and  irrelevant  for  another      72 
Thus  the  argument  that  the  great  man  owes  his  faculties  to  his  ances- 
tors, and  through   his   ancestors  to   the  society  which  helped  to 
develop  his  ancestors,  though  a  speculative  truism,         •         •         •       73 
leads  to  nothing  but  absurdities  if  we  apply  it  to  practical  life        .        .      74 
For  if  the  great  workers  owe  their   greatness  to  the  whole  of  past 
society,  the  men  who  shirk  work  owe  their  idleness  to  it;   and  if 
the  former  deserve  no  reward,  the  latter  deserve  no  punishment      .       75 
The  same  argument  applies  to  morals;   and  if  accepted,  we  should  have 
to  admit  that  nobody  really  did,  or  was  really  responsible  for,  any- 
thing         76 

Finally,  let  us  take  the  argument  that  most  of  what  the  great  man 
does  depends  on  past  discoveries  and  past  achievements,  to  which 

he  does  but  add  a  little 77 

If  this  argument  means  anything,  it  must  mean  that  greatness  is  com- 
moner than  it  is  vulgarly  thought 78 

But  is  this  the  case?     Does  Shakespeare's  debt  to  his  antecedents  make 

Shakespeares  more  numerous? 79 

Shakespeare's  contemporaries  had  the  same  national  antecedents  that 

he  had;  but  they  could  not  do  what  he  did 80 

Men  inherit  the  past  only  in  so  far  as  they  can  assimilate  it    .        .        .80 
Socialists  say  that  inventions  once  made  become  common  property        .      81 

This  is  absolutely  untrue 81 

The  discoveries  and  inventions  of  the  past  are  the  property  of  those 

only  who  can  absorb  and  use  them .82 

Thus  the  introduction  of  the  past  into  the  question  leaves  the  differences 

between  the  great  man  and  others  undiminished  ....  82 
If  the  ordinary  m.an  does  anything,  the  great  man  does  a  great  deal  more  83 
and  in  practical  reasoning  he  is  a  true  cause  for  the  sociologist  .  .  83 
And,  curiously  enough,  Mr.  Spencer  unconsciously  admits  this  .  .  84 
He  declares  that  the  Napoleonic  wars  were  entirely  due  to  the  malefi- 
cent greatness  of  Napoleon 84 


CONTENTS  xiii 


PAGB 


He  defends  patents  because  they  represent  the  very  substance  of  the  in- 

venter's  own  mind; 86 

and  he  attributes  the  modern  improvement  in  steel  manufacture  to  Sir 

H.  Bessemer    ...........      87 

So  much,  then,  being  established,  we  must  consider  two  difficulties  sug- 
gested by  it      88 


CHAPTER   IV 

The  Great  Man  as  distinguished  from  the  Physiologi- 
cally Fittest  Survivor 

It  may  be  objected  that  modern  sociology  does  not,  as  here  asserted, 
neglect  the  great  man,  for  it  adopts  the  doctrine  of  the  survival  of 

the  fittest 89 

It  may  be  asked,  on  the  other  hand,  what  place  the  great  man  has  in 

an  exclusively  evolutionary  theory  of  progress 90 

The  fittest  survivor  is  not  the  same  as  the  great  man       ....  90 

He  plays  a  part  in  progress,  but  not  the  same  part go 

The  fittest  men,  by  surviving,  raise  the  general  level  of  the  race,  and 

promote  progress  only  in  this  way gi 

The  great  man  promotes  progress  by  being  superior  to  his  contempo- 
raries         92 

The  movement  of  progress  is  double;      . 93 

one  movement  being  very  slow,  the  other  rapid g3 

The  survival  of  the  fittest  causes  the  slow  movement       .        .        .        .  g3 

The  rapid  movement  is  caused  by  the  great  man g5 

Next,  as  to  evolution  —  what  does  the  word  mean?         ....  95 
Its  great  practical  characteristic,  as  put  forward  by  Darwin,  is  that  it  is 

opposed  to  the  doctrine  of  design,  or  divine  intention;    ...  96 
and  yet,  according  to  Darwin,  species  resulted  from  the  intention  of 

each  animal  to  live  and  propagate 96 

Species,  therefore,  according  to  the  evolutionist,  is  the  result  of  inten- 
tion, but  not  the  result  intended 97 

Evolution,  in  fact,  is  the  reasonable  sequence  of  the  unintended     .        .  97 

This  is  as  true  of  social  evolution  as  it  is  of  biological     ....  97 
Many  of  the  social  conditions  of  any  age  result  from  the  past,  but  were 

intended  by  nobody  in  the  past; 98 

for  instance,  many  of  the  social  effects  of  railways  and  cheap  printing     .  98 


xiv  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

PAGE 

Therefore,  whenever  any  great  man  produces  some  change  intentionally 

he  has  to  work  with  unintended  materials 99 

We  can  see  this  in  the  progress  of  dramatic  art; 99 

also  in  the  progress  of  philosophy loo 

And  yet  in  each  case  the  intended  elements  are  equal  or  are  greater 

than  the  unintended loo 

We  see  the  same  thing  in  the  history  of  the  Times  printing  press  .  .  lOl 
It  was  the  result  of  many  kinds  of  unintended  progress,  constantly  re- 

^.        combined  by  intention 102 

Evolution,  in  fact,  is  the  unintended  result  of  the  intentions  of  great 

men 104 

The  unintended  or  evolved  element  in  progress  is  what  concerns  the 

speculative  philosopher 105 

The  intended  element,  which  originates  directly  in  the  great  man,  is 

what  is  of  interest  for  practical  purposes 106 

BOOK   II 

CHAPTER  I 

The  Nature  and  the  Degrees  of  the  Superiorities  of 
Great  Men 

The  causality  of  the  great  man  being  established,  we  must  consider 

more  precisely  what  greatness  is IH 

Mr.  Spencer  will  help  us  to  a  general  definition  of  it  .  .  .  .112 
He  divides  the   human   race   into   the   clever,  the  ordinary,  and  the 

stupid      .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .         -IIS 

Now  if  all  the  race  were  stupid,  it  is  plain  there  would  be  no  progress;  .  114 
nor  would  there  be  any  if  all  the  race  were  ordinary;  .  .  .  ,114 
therefore  progress  must  be  due  to  the  clever,  who  are,  as  Mr.  Spencer 

S3.y5,  3k  "  scattered  few"     . 115 

This  is  the  great-man  theory  reasonably  stated 1 15 

For  great  men  are  not  necessarily  heroes,  as  Carlyle  thought,  .        .116 

nor  divided  absolutely  from  all  other  men 1 16 

Greatness  is  various  in  kind  and  degree, 117 

but,  at  all  events,  there   is  a  certain   minority  of  men  who  resemble 

each  other  in  being  more  efficient  than  the  majority   .         .         •     "7 

We  see  this  in  poetry, 1 18 

in  singers, 118 


CONTENTS  XV 


rxcs 


in  the  scholarship  of  boys  at  the  same  school, Iig 

and  similarly  in  practical  life Iig 

Enough  men,  as  it  is,  have  equal  opportunities,  to  show  how  unequal 

men  are  in  their  powers  of  using  them  ,  .  .  .  .  .120 
No  doubt  a  man  may  be  ordinary  in  one  respect  and  great  in  another;      120 

but  the  majority  are  not  great  in  any I2i 

The  measure  of  a  man's  greatness  as  an  agent  of  social  progress  is  the 

overt  results  actually  produced  by  him      .         .         .         .         .         .121 

A   selfish   doctor,   if  successful,    is   greater  than    a  devoted  doctor,  if 

unsuccessful     .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .122 

The  fact  that  many  men  who  produce  no  social  results  seem  better  and 

more  brilliant  than  many  men  who  do  produce  them,  makes  some 

argue  that  these  results  require  no  greatness  for  their  production  .  122 
But  the  most  efficient  forms  of  greatness  have  often  nothing  brilliant 

about  them 123 


124 
125 
125 
125 

126 
127 

127 


A  lofty  imagination  is  often  the  enemy  to  practical  efficiency; 
and  great  efficiency  is  often  independent  of  exceptional  intellect     . 
Intellect  is  required  for  progress,  e.g.  in  invention; 

but  the  inventor  by  himself  is  often  helpless, 

and  has  to  ally  himself  with  men  whose  exceptional  gifts  are  unimpres 

sive  and  even  vulgar 

Greatness  is  not  one  quality,  but  various  combinations  of  many 
Greatness,  then,  is  merely  those  qualities  which,  in  any  domain  of  prog 

ress,  make  the  few  more  efficient  than  the  many 
The  great-man  theory,  then,  merely  asserts  that  if  some  men  were  not 

more  efficient  than  most  men,  no  progress  would  take  place  at  all     128 
But  great  men,  in  spite  of  these  differences,  all  promote  progress  in  the 

same  way 128 

CHAPTER   II      4 

Progress  the  Result  of  a  Struggle  not  for  Survival 
BUT  for  Domination 

In  order  to  see  how  the  great  man  promotes  progress,  we  must  consider 

that  whilst  the  fittest  survivor  only  promotes  it  .         .         .         .  130 

by  living,  whilst  others  die, 130 

the  great  man  promotes  progress  by  helping  others  to  live       .         .         •  131 
He  promotes  progress  not  by  what  he  does  himself,  but  by  what  he 

helps  others  to  do 132 


xvi  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

PAGE 

We  can  see  this  by  considering  the  progress  of  knowledge  which,  as 

J.  S.  Mill  says,  is  the  foundation  of  all  progress        .        .        .        .     X32 

But  all  progress  in  knowledge  is  the  work  of  "  decidedly  exceptional 

individuals  i^ 1 34 

as  Mill  admits,  though  in  curiously  confused  language     .        .        .        •     I35 

Now  how  do  the  exceptional  individuals,  when  they  acquire  knowledge, 

promote  progress  by  doing  so? 136 

They  promote  progress  by  conveying  their  knowledge  to,  and  imposing 

their  conclusions  on,  others      . 137 

A  similar  thing  is  true  of  invention,  which  is  knowledge  applied     .         .138 

Invention  promotes  progress  only  because  the  inventor  influences  the 

actions  of  the  workmen  who  make  and  use  his  machines  .         •139 

The  man  of  business  ability  promotes  progress  also  only  by  so  ordering 

others  that  the  precise  wants  of  the  public  are  supplied    .         .         .140 
/  And  the  same  principle  is  obviously  true  in  the  domain  of  war,  politics, 

and  religion 141 

Greatness,  however,  is  not  in  all  cases  equally  beneficial  .        .        .     142 

The  influence  of  some  great  men  is  more  advantageous  than  that  of 

others 143 

Progress,  then,  involves  a  struggle  through  which  the  fittest  great  men 
shall  secure  influence  over  others,  and  destroy  the  influence  of  the 
less  fit 143 

We  now  come  to  another  point  of  difference  between  the  fittest  great 

man  and  the  fittest  survivor 143 

The  social  counterpart  to  the  Darwinian  struggle  for  survival  is  to  be 

found  in  the  struggle  of  labourers  to  find  employment      .        .        .     144 

But  this  is  not  the  struggle  to  which  historical  progress  is  due  .         .     I45 

For  the  most  rapid  progress  has  taken  place  without  any  increased  fit- 
ness in  the  labourers 145 

The  progressive  struggle  in  industry  is  confined  entirely  to  the  em- 
ployers;    146 

>  and  in  every  domain  of  progress  it  is  confined  to  the  leaders,  to  the 

exclusion  of  those  who  are  led  .......     146 

In  the  progressive  struggle  between  great  men,  the  mass  of  the  com- 
munity play  no  part  whatever 147 

Let  us  take,  for  instance,  two  rival  hotel-keepers 148 

One  becomes  bankrupt,  and  the  other  takes  over   his  hotel  and  his 

staff 148 

The  sole  struggle  is  between  the  employers,  not  the  employed        .        .     148 


CONTENTS  xvii 


FAGB 


The  staff  of  the  unsuccessful  hotel-keeper  gain,  not  lose,  by  being  em- 
ployed by  the  successful 149 

Historical  progress,  then,  results  from  a  struggle  not  for  subsistence, 

but  for  domination 149 


CHAPTER   III     ' 

The  Means  by  which  the  Great  Man  applies  his 
Greatness  to  Wealth-Production 

All  gain  by  the  domination  of  the  fittest,  except  the  few  who  fail  to 

secure  power  for  themselves     ,         .         .         .         .         .         .         •     ^S^ 

We   must   consider,   however,   that   the   great  men  who   struggle   for 

domination  would  not  do  so  without  some  strong  motive ;  .  •  ^$2 
and  also  that  they  cannot  dominate  others  except  by  some  particular 

means 153 

Now  the  question  of  motive  we  will  treat  of  hereafter.     At  present  we 

will  confine  ourselves  to  the  question  of  means         .         .         .         '153 

These  vary  in  each  domain  of  social  activity 153 

In  some  they  are  too  obvious  to  need  discussion 154 

We  need  consider  what  they  are  only  in  the  domains  of  politics  and 

wealth-production 155 

The  question  is  most  important  in  its  bearings  on  wealth-production  .  156 
The  great  man  in  wealth-production  can  influence  the  actions  of  others 

by  two  means  only —  by  the  slave-system  and  the  wage-system  .  157 
The  slave-system   secures  obedience  by  coercion,  the  wage-system  by 

inducement      ...........     157 

Wage-capital,  not  fixed  capital,  gives  the  primary  power  to  capitalism 

as  a  productive  agent 158 

Wage-capital  is  an  accumulation  of  the  necessaries  of  life,       .        .        •     ^59 

owned  or  controlled  by  a  few  persons, 159 

and  apportioned  by  them  amongst  many,  on  certain  conditions  .  .160 
Karl  Marx  entirely  misunderstood  what  these  conditions  are  .  .  .160 
The  essence  of  these  conditions  is  that  the  many  shall  be  technically 

directed  by  the  few l6l 

The  question  of  how  much  the  few  appropriate  of  the  product  is  a 

separate  question  altogether 162 

The   corvee  system  or  slavery  would   make  wage-capital  superfluous; 

and  this  shows  what  the  essential  function  of  wage-capital  is  .        .162 


xviii  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

PAGB 

So-called  "  co-operation  "  is  merely  the  wage-system  disguised        .         .     163 

There  are,  then,  only  two  alternatives  —  the  wage-system  and  the  slave- 
system; 164 

as  we  shall  find  by  considering  how  the  socialists  can  only  escape  the 

wage-system  by  substituting  slavery .         .         .         .         .         .         .165 

For  they  would  secure  industrial  obedience  by  coercion,  .         .        .166 

not  through  the  worker's  desire  to  earn  his  living.     And  this  is  the 

essence  of  slavery     .        .        .         .        .        .         .        .         .         .166 

Next  let  us  consider  the  means  by  which  the  great  directors  of  industry 

compete  against  one  another    ........     167 

Under  capitalism  they  do  so,  owing  to  the  fact  that  the  man  who 
cannot  direct  industry  so  as  to  please  the  public  loses  his  capital, 
and  with  it  the  means  of  direction 167 

The  wage-system  is  the   only  efficient   means   of  competition  of  this 

kind 168 

The  socialists,  though  they  affect  to  be  opposed  to  competition  alto- 
gether  168 

re-introduce  it  into  their  own  system 170 

the  only  change  being  that  it  is  associated  with  the  slave-system,  which 

is  very  cumbrous  and  inefficient        .         .         .         .         .         .         .170 

Competition  between  employers,  then,  is  a  part  of  every  system  that 

permits  of  progress;       .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .172 

and  since  the  re-introduction  of  slavery  is  practically  impossible,  we 
must  regard  the  wage-system  as  a  permanent  feature  of  progressive 
societies.         .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .172 

We  might  reduce   society  to  ashes,  but  this  system   and   capitalistic 

competition  would  arise  out  of  them ;       .         .         .         .         .         .173 

for  capitalistic  competition  means  the  domination  of  the  fittest  great  men     174 
/  The  industrial  obedience  of  the  many  to  the  few  is  the  fundamental 
^  condition  of  progress 174 


CHAPTER   IV 

The  Means  by  which  the  Great  Man  acquires  Power 
IN  Politics 

In  discussing  the  means  by  which  the  great  man  wields  power  in 
politics,  the  debatable  question  differs  from  the  question  raised  by 
his  power  in  industry; 176 


CONTENTS  xix 


PAGB 


for  the  points  that  are  debated  in  the  case  of  the  great  wealth-producer 

are  admitted  by  all  in  the  case  of  the  governor         .         .         ,         .176 

The  greatest  democrat  admits  that  the  governor  must  be  an  exceptional 

man,         ............     177 

and  also  that  he  must  be  chosen  by  elective  competition         .         .         -177 

There  is  a  competitive  element  even  in  autocracies,         ,        .        .        .178 

and  democracies  are  essentially  competitive    .         .         .         .         .         .178 

All  parties   also   agree   that    laws    must    be   enforced    by  pains   and 

penalties 179 

Democrats  are  peculiar  only  in  their  theory  that  the  sole  greatness  re- 
quired in  their  governors  is  a  perceptive  and  executive  greatness, 
which  will  enable  them  to  carry  out  the  spontaneous  wishes  of  the 
many       .        .         .        .        .        .        .         .        .         .        .         -179 

This  is  the  only  point  in  which  the  democratic  theory  differs  from  the 

aristocratic       ...........     180 

The  democratic  ruler  is,  theoretically,  a  balance  for  weighing  the  wills 

of  the  many,    ...........     181 

or  a  machine  for  executing  their  "mandates"; 182 

and  there  are  signs  which  might  suggest  that  the  few  in  politics  are 

really  becoming  the  mere  instruments  of  the  many  ....     182 

But  these  signs  are  deceptive;   for  what  seems  the  will  of  the  many, 

really  depends  on  the  action  of  another  minority      .         .         .         .183 

Opinions,  to  derive  power  from  the  numbers  who  hold  them,  must  be 

identical; 184 

but  they  seldom  are  identical  till  a  few  men  have  manipulated  them        .     184 

Thus  what  seems  to  be  the  opinion  of  the  many  is  generally  dependent 

on  the  influence  of  a  few  ........     185 

The  many,  for  instance,  would  never  have  had  any  opinions  on 
Free  Trade  or  Bimetallism  if  the  few  had  not  worked  on 
them 185 

Popular  opinion  requires  exceptional  men,  as  nuclei,  round  which  to 

form  itself 187 

Thus  even  in  what  seems  extremest  democracy  the  few  are  essential        .     188 

Democrats,  however,  may  argue  that  under  democracy  the  few  do,  in 

the  long-run,  carry  out  the  wishes  of  the  many         ....     188 

Even  were  this  true,  the  current  formulas  of  democracy  would  be  false, 
for  unequal  men  would  be  essential  to  executing  the  wishes  of 
equals 189 

Now  in  reality  the  few  are  never  mere  passive  agents;    ....     189 


XX  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

PAGE 

but  nevertheless  the  many  do  impress  their  will  on  them  to  a  great 

extent 190 

The  question  is  to  a'.^a/ extent  ? 191 

This  introduces  us  to  a  new  side  of  the  problem  —  the  extent  of  the 

power  of  the  many  ..........  191 

This  is  greater  in  politics  than  in  industry; 192 

and  yet  when  we  think  it  over  we  shall  see  that  it  is  great  in  most 

domains  of  activity 192 

We  had  to  take  it  for  granted  at  starting.    We  must  now  examine  it      .193 


BOOK    III 
CHAPTER  I 

How  TO   DISCRIMINATE   BETWEEN  THE   PaRTS   CONTRIBUTED  TO 

A  Joint  Product  by  the  Few  and  by  the  Many 

Mill  declares  that  when  two  agencies   are  essential  to  producing  an 

effect,  their  respective  contributions  to  it  cannot  be  discriminated  .  197 
Mill  argues  thus  with  special  reference  to  land  and  labour;  .  .  .  198 
but  he  overlooks  what  in  actual  life  is  the  main  feature  of  the  case  .     198 

The  labour  remaining  the  same,  the  product  varies  with  the  quality  of 

the  land 198 

The  extra  product  resulting  from  labour  on  superior  land  is  due   to 

land,  not  labour        ..........     199 

This  is  easily  proved  by  a  number  of  analogous  illustrations  .  .  .  199 
Mill  errs  by  ignoring  the  changing  character  of  the  effect  .  .  .  201 
The  case  of  labour  directed  by  different  great  men  is  the  same  as  the 

case  of  labour  applied  to  different  qualities  of  land.      The  great 

men  produce  the  increment 202 

Labour,  however,  must  be  held  to  produce  that  minimum  necessary  to 

support  the  labourer,        .........     203 

both  in  agriculture 203 

and  in  all  kinds  of  production 204 

The  great  man  produces  the  increment  that  would  not  be  produced  if 

his  influence  ceased  .........     204 

Labour,  it  is  true,  is  essential  to  the  production  of  the  increment  also;     205 


CONTENTS  xxi 

?AGB 

but  we  cannot  draw  any  conclusions  from  the  hypothesis  of  labour 

ceasing; 205 

for  the  labourer  would  have  to  labour  whether  the  great  men  were  there 

or  no 206 

The  cessation  of  the  great  man's  influence  is  a  practical  alternative;  the 

cessation  of  labour  is  not,         ........  206 

as  we  see  by  frequent  examples       ........  206 

Thus  the  great  man,  in  the  most  practical  sense,  produces  what  labour 

would  not  produce  in  his  absence 208 

An  analysis  of  practical  reasoning  as  to  causes  generally  will  show  us 

the  truth  of  this 208 

For  practical  purposes  the  cause  of  an  effect  is  that  cause  only  which 

may  or  may  not  be  present; 209 

as  we  see  when  men  discuss  the  cause  of  a  fire,       .        .        .        .        ,210 

or  of  the  accuracy  of  a  chronometer, 2IO 

or  the  causes  of  danger  to  a  man  hanging  on  to  a  rope  .  .  .  .211 
But  there  is  another  means  of  discriminating  between  the  products  of 

exceptional  men  and  ordinary  men 212 

This  is  by  an  analysis  of  the  faculties  necessary  to  produce  the  product  .  213 

Are  these  faculties  possessed  by  all,  or  by  a  few  only?    ....  213 


CHAPTER   II 

The  Nature  and  Scope  of  purely  Democratic  Action, 
OR  THE  Action  of  Average  Men  in  Co-operation 

Carlyle  was  wrong  in  his  claim  for  the  great  man  because  he  failed  to 
note  that  his  powers  were  conditioned  by  the  capacities  of  the 
ordinary  men  influenced  by  him        .......     215 

The  socialists  are  wrong  because,  seeing  that  the  many  do  something, 

they  argue  that  they  do  everything 215 

What  the  many  do  is  limited.      We  must  see  precisely  what  the  limits 

are 216 

If  a  Russian  conspirator  employs  a  hundred  workmen  to  dig  what  they 

think  is  a  cellar,  but  is  a  mine  for  blowing  up  the  Czar,  .         .         .     216 

the  conspirator  contributes  the  entire  criminal  character  of  the  enter- 
prise          217 

When  a  choir  sings  Handel's  music,  Handel  contributes  the  specific 

character  of  the  sounds  sung  by  them       .        .        .        .        .        .217 


xxii  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

PAGB 

Let  us  turn  to  the  facts  of  progress, 217 

and  begin  with  economic  progress  and  progress  in  knowledge  .         .  2l8 

In  the  case  of  economic  progress  we  must  apply  the  method  of  inquiring 
what  is  produced  by  labour  with  and  without  the  assistance  of  the 

great  man 2i8 

To  the  question  of  progress  in  knowledge  we  must  apply  the  method  of 

inquiring  what  faculties  are  involved  in  it         .         .         .         .         .  219 

These  are  faculties  entirely  confined  to  the  few        .....  219 

And  now  let  us  turn  to  political  government  ......  220 

What  can  the  faculties  of  average  men  do  when  left  to  themselves?         .  220 

They  can  accomplish  only  the  simplest  actions, 220 

and  formulate  only  the  simplest  demands 221 

The  moment  matters  become  at  all  complex  the  faculties  of  the  excep- 
tional man  are  required 221 

Now  in  any  civilised  country  few  governmental   measures  are   really 

simple      ............  222 

Exceptional  men  must  simplify  them  for  the  many 222 

Thus  the  voice  of  the  many,  in  all  complex  cases,  echoes  the  voice  of 

the  few 223 

This,  however,  is  not  the  end  of  the  matter; 224 

for  the  details  of  governmental  measures  are  not  the  whole  of  govern- 
ment       ............  224 

The  true  power  of  democracy  is  to  be  seen  in  religious  and  family  life     .  224 

Though  the  influence  of  the  great  man  in  religion  is  enormous,       .         .  225 
yet  religions  have  only  grown  and  endured  because  they  touch  the  heart 

of  the  average  man 225 

Christianity  exemplifies  this  fact, 225 

and  especially  Catholicism       .........  226 

The   doctrines  formulated  by  the  aristocracy  of  Popes  and  Councils 

originated  among  the  mass  of  common  believers     ....  227 

Theologians  and  councils  merely  reasoned  on  the  materials  thus  given 

them 228 

Catholicism  shows  the  great  part  played  by  the  many  so  clearly,  because 

the  part  played  by  the  few  is  defined  by  it  so  sharply        .         .         .  228 
Catholicism,  however,  is  only  alluded  to  here  because  it  illustrates  the 

essential  nature  of  truly  democratic  action 229 

Thus  enlightened  by  it,  let  us  turn  back  to  family  life      ....  230 
Catholicism   shows  that   democracy  is  a  natural   coincidence  of  con- 
clusions           ...  231 


CONTENTS  xxiii 

PAGE 

The  home  life  of  a  nation  depends  on  the  same  coincidence,  or  on  spon- 
taneously similar  propensities  .         .         .         .         .         .         .         •231 

This  truly  democratic  coincidence  forces  all  governments  to  accommo- 
date themselves  to  it 233 

The  same  democratic  power  determines  the  structure  of  our  houses,        .     233 

and  the  furniture  and  other  commodities  in  them,    .....     234 

and  indeed  all  economic  products 234 

For  though  in  the  process  of  production  the  many  are  dependent  on  the 

few 235 

(a  fact  which  the  powers  of  trade  unionism  do  but  make  more  appar- 
ent),          235 

yet  it  is  the  wants  and  tastes  of  the  many  which  determine  what  shall  be 

produced; 238 

and  though  great  men  elicit  these  wants  by  first  supplying  them,     .         .     239 

the  wants  themselves  must  be  latent  in  the  nature  of  the  many,  and  when 

once  aroused  are  essentially  democratic  phenomena  .         .         .     239 

Thus  though  economic  supply  is  aristocratic,  economic  demand  is  purely 

democratic        ...........     240 

The  most  gifted  brewer  cannot  make  the  public  drink  beer  they  do  not 

like 241 

Now  in  politics  also  there  is  a  similar  demand  and  supply;      .         .         .     242 

but  the  truly  democratic  demand  in  politics  is  not  for  laws       .         .         .     242 

The  demand  for  laws  is  not  the  counterpart  of  a  demand  for  commodi- 
ties, for  commodities  are  demanded  for  their  own  sake,  laws  for  the 
sake  of  their  results 243 

The  demand  for  laws  is  like  a  demand  that  commodities  shall  be  made 

by  some  special  kind  of  machinery 243 

No  one  makes  this  latter  demand.  Economic  demand  is  single;  politi- 
cal demand  is  double 244 

Political  democracy  is  vulgarly  identified  with  the  demand  not  for  social 

goods,  but  for  machinery  ........     244 

But  in  so  far  as  democracy  is  a  demand  not  for  goods  but  for  machinery, 

it  is  not  purely  democratic        ........     245 

The  demands  of  the  many  are  manipulated  by  the  few    ....     245 

Why,  then,  is  democracy  especially  associated  with  the  demand  in  which 

its  power  is  least? 246 

Because  it  is  the  only  sphere  of  activity  in  which  the  many  can  interfere 

with  the  machinery  of  supply  at  all; 246 

and  they  can  interfere  with  it  here  because  the  effects  of  political  gov- 


xxiv  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

FACE 

ernment  on  life  are  less  close  and  important  than  the  effects  of  busi- 
ness management  on  business; 247 

and  in  any  case  the  apparent  power  of  the  many  is  even  here  controlled 

by  the  few 247 

The  power  of  the  many  is  a  power  to  determine  the  quality  of  civilisa- 
tion and  progress,  not  to  produce  them 248 


CHAPTER    III 

,r 

The  Qualities  of  the  Ordinary  as  opposed  to  the 
Great  Man 

It  will  be  objected  that  the  conclusions  reached  in  the  last  chapter  dero- 
gate from  the  dignity  of  the  average  man 250 

But  they  do  not  really  do  so; 251 

for  since  the  great  man,  as  here  technically  defined,  is  the  man  who  in- 
fluences others  so  as  to  promote  progress,         .         .         .         .         •     25 1 
the  ordinary  man,  as  opposed  to  him,  need  not  be  stupid         .        .        .252 
He  is  merely  the  man  whose  talents  do  not  increase  the  efficiency  of 

other  men 252 

Poets,  in  this  technical  sense,  are  ordinary  men        .....     252 

So  are  the  most  skilful  manual  workers,  .......     253 

for  very  great   manual   skill   does   not  promote  progress  or  influence 

others, 254 

unless  it  can  be  metamorphosed   into   the   shape  of  orders   given  to 

others       ............     256 

Again,  brilliance  or  charm  in  private  life  does  not  promote  progress        .     256 
Therefore  ordinary  men,  who  do  not  promote  progress,  are  not  asserted 

to  be  lacking  in  high  qualities .         .         .         .         .         .         .         -257 

Indeed,  what  is  really  interesting  in  human  nature  is  the  typical  part  of 

it,  not  the  exceptional,      .........     258 

as  we  may  see  by  referring  to  art  and  poetry   ......     258 

Average   opinion   also    on   social   matters   is   for   each    class   the  wise 

opinion; 259 

and  the  average  faculties  shared  by  all  are  in  one  sense  the  test  of 

truth 259 

Therefore  in  denying  to  the  average  man  the  powers   that   promote 

progress   ... 260 


CONTENTS  XXV 


FACE 


we  are  not  degrading  the  average  man.     We  are  merely  asserting  that 

these  powers  form  but  a  small  part  of  life 260 

Socialists  can  object  to  this  conclusion  only  because  it  establishes  the 

claim  of  exceptional  men  to  exceptional  wealth  ....  262 
They  cannot  have  any  theoretical  objections  to  it,  for  they  are  beginning 

to  recognise  the  importance  of  the  exceptional  man  themselves,  .  263 
and  only  obscure  the  fact  for  purposes  of  popular  agitation  .  .  .  264 
So  far,  however,  as  the  reasoning  of  this  book  has  gone  already,  no 

claim  has  been  made  for  the  great  man  to  which  socialists  need 

object;      ............     264 

for  we  have  assumed  that  he  keeps  none  of  the  exceptional  wealth  he 

makes,  for  himself, 265 

but  that  he  works  exactly  on  the  terms  the  socialists  would  dictate  to 

him 266 

It  now  remains  to  consider  whether  he  would  really  do  so       .        .        .     266 


BOOK    IV 

CHAPTER   I 

The  Dependence  of  Exceptional  Action  on  the  Attaina- 
bility OF  Exceptional  Reward,  or  the  Necessary  Cor- 
respondence    BETWEEN    THE     MOTIVES    TO  ACTION     AND    ITS 

Results 

Great  men  differ  from  ordinary  men  in  degree  only,  not  in  kind,     .         .     271 

and  the  use  of  exceptional  powers  is  conditioned  like  the  use  of  ordinary 

powers     ............     272 

Now  let  us  take  the  most  universal  powers  possessed  by  man,  viz.  those 

used  in  acquiring  the  simplest  food  .......     272 

Man's  powers  in  agriculture  would  be  latent  unless  man  wanted  food 

and  the  earth's  surface  were  cultivable      ......     272 

Thus  the  exercise  of  the  simplest  faculties  depends  on  the  want  of  some 

certain  object,  and  the  possibility  of  attaining  it       ...         .     273 

If  this  is  true  of  the  commonest  faculties,  which  aim  at  supplying  neces- 
saries, much  more  is  it  true  of  rare  faculties,  which  aim  at  producing 
superfluities 273 


xxvi  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

PAGE 

Society,  then,  if  great  men  are  to  work  in  it,  must  be  so  constituted  as  to 

make  the  reward  they  desire  possible        ......  274 

In  so  doing  society  makes  a  contract  with  its  great  men;         .         .         .  274 

and  this  is  a  contract  which  is  being  constantly  revised   ....  275 

The  great  men  themselves  are  the  ultimate  fixers  of  their  own  price         .  276 
Here  is  the  final  proof  that  living  great  men,  not  past  conditions,  are 

the  c?^MSts  practically  involved  in  progress        .....  276 

Thus  living  great  men  are  masters  of  the  situation  .....  277 

because  no  one  can  tell  that   they  have  exceptional  powers  till   they 

choose  to  show  them      .........  277 

They  cannot,  therefore,  be  coerced  from  withou%  like  ordinary  workers  .  278 

They  must  be  induced  to  work  by  a  reward     ......  278 

which  they  themselves  feel  to  be  sufficient 279 

Hence  the  great  man's  character  and  requirements  impress  themselves 

on  the  structure  of  society 279 

This  is  what  socialists  constantly  forget 280 

and  they  propose  to  equalise  matters  by  not  offering  great  men  any  ex- 
ceptional reward 281 

They  forget  to  ask  whether,  under  these  circumstances,  great  men  would 

exercise  or  reveal  their  exceptional  powers  at  all      .         .         .         .  281 

Exceptional  rewards  are  essential  to  exceptional  action   ....  282 

We  must  inquire  what  the  required  exceptional  rewards  are    .        .        .  283 


CHAPTER   II 

The  Motives  of  the  Exceptional  Wealth-Producer 

Socialists,  though  often  forgetting  the  necessity  of  exceptional  motives, 

often  remember  it,    .........         .     284 

and  endeavour  to  show  that  socialistic  society  would  have  sufficient  re- 
wards to  offer  to  its  great  men,  .......     284 

such   as   the   pleasure  of  doing  good,  of  excelling,  and  of  receiving 

honour 285 

The  fundamental  question  is,  will  such  rewards  as  these  stimulate  great 

men  to  wealth-production?       ........     285 

Is  the  enjoyment  of  exceptional  wealth  superfluous  as  a  motive  to  pro- 
ducing it? 286 

If  it  is  so,  it  is  for  the  socialists  to  prove  that  it  is  so;      .        .        .        .    286 


CONTENTS  xxvii 


FAGB 


for  they  themselves  admit  that  it  has  not  been  so  in  the  past,  and  is 

not  actually  so  now 287 

Are   there   any  signs,  then,  that  the  desire  for   exceptional  wealth  is 

beginning  to  lose  its  power?.         .......     288 

We  shall  find  that  the  socialists  themselves  maintain  just  the  contrary;   .     288 

for  they  appeal  to  the  desire  of  each  producer  to  possess  all  he  pro- 
duces as  the  most  universal  and  permanent  desire  in  man;       .         .     289 

and  never  questioned  this  so  long  as  they  believed  that  the  sole  pro- 
ducer was  the  labourer     .........     289 

They  questioned  the  doctrine  only  when  they  came  to  see  that  the 
great  man  is  a  producer  also;  and  they  confine  their  questioning 
to  his  case        ...........     290 

But  if  the  labourer  desires  to  possess  what  he  produces,  much  more 

will  the  great  man  do  so;      .         . 290 

for  even  if  he  gives  away  what  he  produces,  he  desires  to  possess  it  first     291 

There  is  no  sign,  therefore,  that  the  desire  for  exceptional  wealth  is 

losing  force  as  a  motive  ........     292 

Are,  then,  other  desires  acquiring  new  force  as  motives  to  wealth-pro- 
duction?   292 

Are  the  joys  of  excelling,  of  benefiting  others,  or  of  being  honoured  by 

others,  doing  so? 293 

The  desire  of  these  joys  is  a  motive  to  certain  kinds  of  exceptional 

conduct   ............     293 

It  is  a  motive  to  benevolent  action  and  religious  work;  ....     293 

But  neither  of  these  are  the  same  thing  as  wealth-production        .        .     294 

It  is  a  motive  to  artistic  production,  certainly,         .....     294 

and  also  to  scientific  discovery;       ........     295 

and   works  of  art  are  wealth,  and  scientific  discovery  is  the   basis  of 

industrial  progress; 296 

but  great  art  forms  but  a  small  part  of  wealth,         .....     296 

and  artistic  effort  other  than  the  highest  is  motived  by  the  desire  of 

pecuniary  reward, 297 

whilst  scientific  discoveries,  though  made  generally  from  the  desire  for 
truth,  are  applied  to  wealth-production  because  the  men  who  apply 
them  desire  wealth 297 

What,  however,  of  the  fact  that  the  desire  for  honour  makes  the  soldier 

work  harder  than  any  labourer?       .......     298 

Why,  the  socialists  ask,  should  not  the  same  desire  make  the  great 

wealth-producer  work  ? 299 


xxviii  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


PAGE 


Mr.  Frederic  Harrison  has  urged  a  similar  argument  ....  299 
The  answer  to  this  is  that  the  work  of  the  soldier  is  exceptional;  .  .  300 
and  we  cannot  argue  from  it  to  the  work  of  ordinary  life  .  .  .  301 
The  fighting  instinct  is  inherent  in  the  dominant  races,  ....     302 

in  a  way  in  which  the  industrial  instinct  is  not 303 

And  even  in  war  those  who  make  the  prolonged  intellectual  efforts 

required,  ask  for  themselves  other  rewards  besides  honour        .         .     303 

Still  more  will  the  great  wealth-producers  do  so 304 

There  is  therefore  nothing  to  show  that  these  other  motives  will  super- 
sede the  desire  of  wealth 304 

What  they  really  do,  and  what  socialists  fail  to  see,  is  to  mix  with  the 

desire  for  wealth,  and  add  to  its  efficiency        .         .         .         .         .     304 
As  the  desire  of  wealth  has  mixed  with  other  desires  in  men  like  Bacon, 

Rubens,  etc 305 

For  in  saying  that  the  desire  of  wealth  is  essential  as  a  motive  to 
wealth-production  we  do  not  mean  the   desire  of  wealth  for   its 

own  sake,         . 305 

or  for  the  sake  of  physical  gratification 306 

This  forms  a  small  part  of  its  desirability 306 

It  is  desired  mainly  as  a  means  to  power,  and  to  those  very  pleasures 

which  socialists  offer  instead  of  it 307 

The  great  wealth-producers,  susceptible  to  the  motives  on  which 
socialists  dwell,  will  desire  exceptional  wealth  all  the  more  be- 
cause of  them 308 

It  is  argued,  however,  by  semi-socialists  that  the  actual  producer  may 
be  allowed  the  income  he  produces,  but  that  this  must  end  with 
his  life,  and  not  be  passed  on  to  his  family  as  interest  on  bequeathed 

capital 309 

It  is  claimed  that  this  arrangement  would  coincide  with  abstract  justice,  310 
for  it  is  argued  that  all  wealth  which  is  not  worked  for  must  be  stolen  310 
This  is  utterly  untrue,  as  the  case  of  flocks  and  herds  shows  us;  .  •  311 
but  the  chief  producer  of  wealth  that  is  not  worked  for  is  capital,  which 

is  past  productive  ability  stored  up  and  externalised  .         .         '311 

The  dart  of  a  savage  hunter, 312 

the  manure  heap  or  cart  horse  of  a  peasant, 312 

are  forms  of  capital  which  actually  produce,  and  the  product  belongs 

to  those  who  own  them    .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .         -313 

The  same  is  the  case  with  such  capital  as  engines  and  manufacturing 

plant 313 


CONTENTS  xxix 


PAGE 


These  implements  are  like  a  race  of  iron  negroes,  and  are  producers  as 

truly  as  live  negroes  would  be 314 

Indirectly,  wage  capital  is  also  a  producer  in  the  same  way     ,         .         .     314 

And  indeed,  till  they  saw  that  this  argument  could  be  turned  against 

themselves,  it  was  strongly  urged  by  the  socialists    .         .         .         -315 

Practically,  however,  the  justification  of  income  from  capital  .        .        .316 

rests  on  the  fact  that  the  power  of  capital  to  yield  income  is  what 

mainly  makes  men  anxious  to  produce  it;  ,         .         .         .         .316 

since  if  income-yielding  capital  could  not  be  acquired  and  amassed, 

wealthy  men  could  make  no  provision  for  their  families,         ,         •     317 

nor  could  wealth  give  pleasure  to  those  who  might  at  any  moment  be 

beggars 318 

Moreover,  if  incomes  were  not  heritable,  wealth  would  produce  none  of 
those  social  results,  such  as  continuous  culture,  etc.,  which  make  it 
valuable  ............     319 

The  wealth  that  ceased  with  the  men  that  actually  made  it  would  pro- 
duce a  society  of  beasts 319 

Wealth  is  desirable  because  it  is  the  physical  basis  of  an  enlarged  life;  .     320 

and  there  must  thus  be  continuity  in  the  possession  of  wealth         .         .     320 

Hence  the  great  wealth-producer  demands  the  possession  not  only  of 
what  he  produces  directly,  but  of  what  he  produces  indirectly 
through  his  past  products         ........     321 

The  majority  not  only  may,  but  do,  acquire  a  share  of  the  increment 

produced  by  the  great  man;   ........     322 

but  whatever  this  share  may  be,  it  can  never  be  such  as  to  make  social 

conditions  equal 322 


CHAPTER   III 

Equalitv.^  of  Educational  Opportunity 

The  wealthy  class,  owing  to  inheritance,  is  always  much  more  numerous 
than  the  great  men  actually  engaged  at  any  given  time  in  produc- 
tion   324 

But  though  inheritance  gives  a  certain  permanence  to  the  wealthy 
class,  the  families  belonging  to  it  are  constantly,  if  slowly, 
changing, 325 

and  new  men  are  constantly  forcing  their  way  into  it  .         .         .     326 


XXX  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

FACE 

Indeed  the  wealth  of  the  country  depends  on  the  men  potentially  great 
as  producers   actualising  their  talents  and  producing  the  wealth 

that  raises  them 329 

It  is  therefore  obvious  that  the  wealth  will  increase  in  proportion  as 
these   potentially  great   men  have  the  opportunity  of  actualising 

their  productive  powers 327 

It  is  impossible,  however,  to  make  opportunities  absolutely  equal  .  .  328 
The  question  is  how  near  we  can  approach  to  equality  ....  328 
In  a  country  where  these  opportunities  have  been  made  artificially  un- 
equal there  will  be  room  for  a  great  deal  of  equalisation  .  .  .  329 
But  removing  artificial  impediments  is  only  a  negative  kind  of  equalisation  329 
It  is  probable,  however,  that  for  the  development  of  genius  of  the  high- 
est order  this  is  all  that  is  needful, 330 

and  will  secure  the  development  of  all  the  genius  of  the  highest  kind 

that  exists        ...........     331 

But  genius  of  a  lesser  kind,  which  would  else  be  lost,  may,  no  doubt, 

be  ehcited  by  positive  educational  help  from  the  State;       .         .     332 
though    the   amount   of   such   genius   is   overestimated    by   reformers, 
because  they  confuse  talents  rare  in  themselves  with  accomplish- 
ments that  are  only  rare  accidentally 332 

The  latter  can  be  increased  indefinitely,  the  former  not  ....     ^t,^ 

For  real  productive  genius  there  is  always  room,     .....     333 

but  the  economic  utility  of  mere  accomplishments  is  limited  by  the  con- 
ditions of  production  at  the  time      .......     333 

Thus  to  produce  more  possible  clerks  than  are  wanted  merely  lowers 
the  wages  of  those   employed,  without   increasing  the   utility  of 
those  who  are  not  employed ........     334 

Still,  within  limits,  educational  help  from  the  State  does  much  to  in- 
crease the  supply  of  exceptional,  though  not  great,  talent     .         .     335 
But  the  main  difficulty  involved  in  the  equalising  of  educational  oppor- 
tunity is  not  the  production  of  good  results,  but  the  avoidance  of 

bad 335 

The  bad  results  are  the  stimulating  of  discontent,  not  in  average  men, 

but  in  men  who  are  really  exceptional 336 

but  those  exceptional  gifts  are  ill-balanced  or  have  some  flaw  in  them    .     337 
For  if  education  sets  free  and  stimulates  sound  intellectual  powers,  .     337 

it  will  similarly  stimulate  intellects  that  are  not  sound,    ....     338 
or  wills,  with  no  intellect  to  match,  and  will  generate  a  desire  for  wealth 

in  men  who  are  not  capable  of  creating  it, 338 


CONTENTS  xxxi 

PACK 

and  thus  will  merely  produce  needless  misery  and  mischief  .  .  .  339 
Education,  again,  stimulates  faculties  that  can  really  produce  excep- 
tional results,  but  not  results  that  are  complete  ....  339 
The  progressive  struggle  requires  that  the  intellects  of  some  should  be 

stimulated,  whose  efforts  fail 340 

But  those    failures   that   promote   progress   are   failures   that   partially 

succeed 34° 

But  there  are  abortive   talents   which   produce  failures  that  have  no 

relation  to  success.     Those  talents  are  purely  mischievous;  .         .     341 

for  example,  the  failure  of  the  would-be  artist, 341 

or  that  of  the  man  who  popularises  wrong  medical  treatment  .         .     342 

But   the   commonest    example   of  this  kind  of  man  is  the  socialistic 

agitator, 342 

who  demands  the  redistribution  of  wealth,  whilst  absolutely  powerless 

to  produce  it, 343 

and  who  consequently  invents  false  theories  about  its  production,  which 

do  nothing  but  demoralise  those  who  are  duped  by  them  .  .  343 
(though  even  these  theories  can  be  discussed  with  profit  under  certain 

circumstances) 344 

Men  like  these  embody  the  two  chief  dangers  of  the  equalisation  of 

educational  opportunity, 345 

namely,  the  rousing  in  the  average  man  wants  he  cannot  satisfy,  and  the 

stimulating  of  talents  that  are  constitutionally  imperfect  .  .  .  345 
The  latter  of  these  dangers  is  the  source  of  the  former  ....  346 
It  cannot  be  completely  avoided,  but  the  present  theories  of  education 

tend  to  heighten,  not  to  minimise  it 346 

The  current  theory  that  all  talents  should  be  developed  is  false,  .  .  347 
so  is  the  theory  that  all  tastes  should  be  cultivated  in  all  alike.     The 

education  proper  for  the  rich  is  not  a  type  but  an  exception  .  .  347 
These  false  theories  rest  on  the  false  belief  that  equal  education  could 

ever  produce  equal  social  conditions 348 

The  majority  of  each  class  will  remain  in  the  class  in  which  they  were 

born         ............     348 

Only  the  efficiently  exceptional  can  rise  out  of  their  own  class,  .  .  348 
and  it  is  the  ambition  of  the  efficiently  exceptional  only  that  it  is  really 

desirable  to  stimulate       .........     349 

The  average  man  should  be  taught  to  aim  at  embellishing  his  position, 

not  at  escaping  from  it     . 349 


xxxii  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

CHAPTER   IV 

Inequality,  Happiness,  and  Progress 


PAGE 


The  radical  politician  will  object  to  the  foregoing  conclusions  in  terms 

with  which  we  are  familiar       .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .351 

The  radical  theorist  will  put  the  same  objections  more  logically.  If  the 
desire  of  exceptional  wealth  is  really  the  strongest  motive,  he  will 
say  that  it  follows  that  most  men,  since  they  cannot  all  be  excep- 
tionally rich,  must  always  remain  miserable       .         .         .         .         ,     352 

Now  the  first  answer  to  this  is  that  the  fact  that  all  men  will  never  be 
equally  wealthy  does  not  prevent  the  conditions  of  all  men  from 
improving  absolutely         .........     353 

Another  answer  is  that  if  inequality  in  the  possession  of  the  most  coveted 
prizes  of  life  implies  misery  amongst  the  majority,  this  evil  would  be 
intensified  rather  than  mitigated  by  socialists,  who  would  substitute 
unequal  honour  for  unequal  wealth  .......     354 

The  final  answer  is  that  the  unequal  distribution  of  wealth  has  no  natural 

tendency  to  cause  unhappiness;        .......     357 

for  men's  desires  vary.  There  is  equality  of  desire  for  the  necessaries  of 
life  only;  for  this  desire  rests  on  men's  physical  natures,  which  are 
similar;    ............     357 

but  the  desire  for  superfluities  depends  on  their  mental  powers,  which 

vary 358 

The  special  appeal  of  luxury  is  mainly  to  the  mind  and  the  imagina- 
tion— 358 

the  luxury,  for  instance,  of  a  large  house,         ......     359 

or  sleeping  accommodation  in  a  train      .......     359 

Consequently  the  desire  for  luxury  and  wealth,  like  the  pleasure  they 

give,  depends  on  peculiar  mental  powers  or  peculiar  mental  states  .     360 

Amongst  most  men  the  desire  for  wealth  is  naturally  a  speculative  desire 

only  ............     361 

It  implies  no  pain  caused  by  the  want  of  wealth      .....     361 

The  desire  ceases  to  be  speculative  and  becomes  a  practical  craving  only 
when  the  imagination  is  exceptionally  strong,  and  a  strong  belief  is  ' 
present  that  the  attainment  of  wealth  is  possible       ....     362 

The  desire  for  wealth,  in  fact,  is  in  proportion  to  each  man's  belief  that 

by  him  personally  it  is  attainable 364 


CONTENTS  xxxiii 


PACB 


This  belief  is  naturally  confined  to  men  with  exceptional  imaginations 

and  exceptional  productive  powers  .......     365 

It  only  becomes  general  by  the  popularising  of  false  theories  which  rep- 
resent wealth  as  attainable  by  all,  without  exceptional  talent  or  ex- 
ceptional exertion     ..........     366 

It  is  roused,  for  instance,  in  a  man  who  suddenly  is  told  that  he  has  a 
legal  right  to  an  estate  which  previously  he  never  thought  of  cov- 
eting          366 

The  socialistic  teaching  of  to-day  creates  a  spurious  desire  for  wealth  by 

its  doctrines  of  impossible  rights  to  it       •         .         .         .         .         .     367 

The  practical  craving  for  wealth  is  naturally  confined  to  those  who  have 
some  talent  for  creating  it,  and  the  pain  caused  by  its  absence  is 
naturally  confined  to  such  men 368 

The  socialistic  theories  merely  cause  a  barren  and  artificial  discontent,     368 

which  interferes  with  that  harmonious  progress  on  which  the  welfare  of 

the  many  depends 369 

These  theories  make  enemies  of  classes  who  would  otherwise  be  allies, 

and  the  cause  of  true  social  reform  suffers  incalculable  injury  .        .     370 

The  object  of  the  present  work  is  to  show  the  fallacy  of  the  theoretic 

basis  of  existing  socialistic  discontent  and  socialistic  aspirations;       .     371 

and  to  show  that  the  many  are  not  a  self-existent  power,        .         ,        .     372 

but  depend  for  all  the  powers  they  possess  on  the  co-operation  of  the     373 
few, 373 

whose  rights  are  as  sacred,  and  whose  power  is  as  great,  as  their  own      .     375 

The  recognition  of  the  fact  that  the  relations  and  positions  of  classes 

can  never  be  fundamentally  altered  .......     376 

(especially  when  we  consider  the  facts  of  history  to  which  Karl  Marx 

drew  attention)         ..........     376 

shows  us  not  only  how  chimerical  are  the  hopes  of  the  socialists,  but 
what  solid  grounds  there  are  for  the  hopes  of  more  rational  re- 
formers     378 


BOOK   I 


CHAPTER   I 

THE    FUNDAMENTAL    ERROR    IN    MODERN 
SOCIOLOGICAL    STUDY 

The   interest   with   which   the   world    in    general,  science  during 

•  111  •  r         ^   •  the  middle  of 

throughout   the   middle    portion    of    this    century,  this  century 

1  J    1       1     ii  c     l_^  •  •  l'         excited  popular 

has  watched  the  progress  oi  the  various  positive  interest  mainiy 
sciences,  would,  when  we  consider   how   abstruse  °"  ^"°.""^  °^ 

'  '  Its  bearing  on 

these  sciences  are,  seem  stransfe  and  almost  inex-*he  doctrines  of 

,.,,.,.  ,  r  <^i   •       r  •     Christianity. 

^      plicable  if  it  were  not  for  one  fact.     This  fact  is 
X)    the  close  and  obvious  bearing  which  the  conclusions 
J^    of    the   sciences   in    question    have    on    traditional 
%    Christianity,  and,  indeed,  on  any  belief  in  immor- 
^    tality   and    the   divine    government    of   the   world. 
ti    The   popular  interest  in  science  remains  still   un- 
abated, but  the  most  careless  observer  can  hardly 
fail   to   perceive  that  the  grounds    of   it   are,  to  a 
certain   extent,  very   rapidly  changing.     They  are  its  popularity 

......  J  1  .  nowisbegin- 

ceasing  to  be  primarily  religious,  and  are  becoming  ning  to  depend 
primarily  social.  The  theories  and  discoveries  of  °"t ^n  reSgious 
the  savant  which  are  examined  with  the  greatest  problems,  but 

o  on  social, 

eagerness   are   no   longer   those  which  affect   our 

3 


4  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I  prospects  of  a  life  in  heaven,  but  those  which  deal 
^^^^  with  the  possibility  of  improving  our  social  condi- 
tions on  earth,  and  which  appeal  to  us  through  our 
sympathies,  not  with  belief  or  doubt,  but  with  the 
principles  which  are  broadly  contrasted  under  the 
names  of  conservative  and  revolutionary. 
Science  itself  is      Such  being  the  case,   it  is    hardly  necessary  to 

undergoing  a  ^.  .,iri  i  i 

corresponding  obscrvc  that  scieucc  itsclf  has  been  undergomg  a 
c  ange.  change    likewise.     The   character   of    the   change, 

however,  requires  to  be  briefly  specified.  From  the 
time  when  geologists  first  startled  the  orthodox 
by  demonstrating  that  the  universe  was  more  than 
six  thousand  years  old,  and  that  something  more 
than  a  week  had  been  occupied  in  the  process  of 
its  construction,  to  the  time,  comparatively  recent, 
during  which  the  genius  of  Darwin  and  others  was 
forcing  on  the  world  entirely  new  ideas  with  regard 
to  the  parentage,  and  presumably  the  nature  of 
man,  there  was  a  certain  limit  —  a  certain  scientific 
frontier  —  at  which  positive  science  practically 
stopped  short.  Having  sedulously  examined  the 
Its  character-   rnatcrials  and  structure  of  the  universe,  until  on  the 

istic  aim  during  ^  i  1  i  • 

the  middle  of   ouc  hand  it  rcachcd  atoms  and  molecules,  it  exam- 
to^deai  wh'ir^^  ined,  on  the  other,  the  first  emergence  of  organic  life, 
phySioiigicai    and  traced  its  developments  till  they  culminated  in 
evolution.       ^^  articulatc-spcaking  human  being.     It   brought 
us,  in  fact,  to  man  on  the  threshold  of  his  subse- 
quent history ;  and  there,  till  very  recently,  positive 
science    left   him.      But    now   there    are   signs   all 
round  us  of  a  new  intellectual  movement,  analogous 
to  that  which  accompanied  the  rise  of  Darwinism, 


THE  RISE    OF  SOCIAL  SCIENCE  5 

and  science  once  again  is  endeavouring  to  enlarge  ^°^ ' 
its  borders.  Having  offered  us  an  explanation  of 
the  origin  of  the  animal  ma7i,  it  proposes  to  deal 
with  the  existing  conditions  of  society  very  much  as 
it  dealt  with  the  structure  of  the  human  body,  to 
exhibit  them  as  the  necessary  result  of  certain  far- 
reaching  laws  and  causes,  and  to  deduce  our 
civilisation  of  to-day  from  the  condition  of  the 
primitive  savage  by  the  same  methods  and  by  the 
aid  of  the  same  theories  as  those  which  it  employed 
in  deducing  the  primitive  savage  from  the  brutes, 
and  the  brutes  in  their  turn  from  primitive  germ 
or  protoplasm.  In  other  words,  the  great  triumph 
of   science    during  what  we  may  call    its   physical  its  character- 

11  1  1  1  1  •    1  r       1  1  'Stic  aim  now 

period  has  been  the  establishment  or   that  theory  is  to  deal  with 

r       ^  ^  i  1    '    1       •  1  1  r  the  evolution 

ot   development  which  is  commonly  spoken  of   as  of  society. 
Evolution,  and  the  application  of  this  to  the  problems 
of  physics  and  biology.     The  object  of  science  in        .^ 
entering  on  what  we  may  call  its  social  period  is  the 
application  of  this  same  theory  to  the  problems  of 
civilisation  and  society. 

It  is  true  that,  if  we  use  the  word  science  in  a 
certain  sense,  the  attempt  to  treat  social  problems  social  science 

•r        11       •  •       •  ir  -r*     T    •       1  itself  is  not 

scientifically  is  not  in  itself  new.  Political  economy,  wholly  new. 
to  say  nothing  of  utilitarian  ethics,  is  a  social  science, 
or  it  is  nothing ;  and  political  economy  had  already 
made  considerable  advances  when  modern  physical 
science  had  hardly  found  its  footing.  But  before 
long  physical  science  passed  it,  with  a  step  that  was 
not  only  more  rapid,  but  also  immeasurably  firmer, 
and  was  presently  giving  such  an  example  of  what 


6  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I      accurate  science  is,  that  it  was   thought   doubtful 

Chapter  i  .    .  '  ^  . 

whether  poHtical  economy  could  be  called  a  science 
at  all.  The  doubt  thus  raised  cannot  be  said  to 
have  justified  itself.  In  spite  of  all  the  attacks  that 
have  been  made  against  the  earlier  economists,  their 
principal  doctrines  survive  to  the  present  day,  as 
being,  so  far  as  they  go,  genuine  scientific  truths. 
But  whenever  the  thinker,  who  has  been  educated 
in  the  school  of  modern  physical  science,  betakes 
himself  now  to  the  study  of  society  and  human 
action,  and  begins  to  apply  to  these  the  developed 
theory  of  evolution,  though  he  does  not  reject  the 
doctrines  of  the  earlier  economists,  he  sees  them  in 
a  new  light,  by  which  their  significance  is  profoundly 
changed.  The  earlier  economists  took  society  as 
they  found  it,  and  they  reasoned  as  though  what 
was  true  of  the  economic  life  around  them  must 
be  absolutely  and  universally  true  of  economic  life 
always.  Here  is  the  point  as  to  which  the  thinker 
What  is  new  is  of  to-day  diff crs  from  them.     He  does  not  dispute 

the  application  iriii*  i  11  -i 

to  it  of  the  the  truth  of  the  deductions  drawn  by  them  with 
^^QQx^T^^  regard  to  society  as  it  existed  during  their  own 
epoch ;  but,  educated  by  the  methods  and  dis- 
coveries of  the  physical  and  biological  evolutionist, 
he  perceives  that  society  itself  is  in  process  of 
constant  change,  that  many  economic  doctrines 
which  have  been  true  during  the  present  century 
had  little  application  to  society  during  the  Middle 
Ages,  and  that  centuries  hence  they  may  perhaps 
have  even  less.  Thus,  though  he  does  not  repudiate 
or  disregard  the  economic  science  of  the  past,  he 


THE  INFLUENCE    OF  SOCIAL  SCIENCE         7 
merges  it  in  a  science  the   scope  of  which  is  far      ^^^''^ 

.  ^,   .  .  .  Chapter  I 

Wider  and  deeper.  This  is '  a  science  which 
primarily  sets  itself  to  explain,  not  how  a  given  set 
of  social  conditions  affects  those  who  live  amons: 
them,  but  how  social  conditions  at  one  epoch  are 
different  from  those  of  another,  how  each  set  of 
conditions  is  the  resultant  of  those  preceding  it,  and 
how,  since  the  society  of  the  present  differs  from 
that  of  the  past,  the  society  of  the  future  is  likely  to 
differ  from  that  of  the  present. 

What  political  economy  has  thus  lost  in  precision  This  excites 
it  has  gained   in   general   interest.     So  long  as  it  gesting  great 

1  1-1  r  li.*  IT       social  changes 

merely  analysed  processes  01  production  and  dis-  in  the  future. 
tribution  which  it  was  assumed  would  always  con- 
tinue without  substantial  modification,  political 
economy  was  mainly  a  science  for  specialists,  and 
was  little  calculated  to  arouse  any  keen  interest  in 
the  public.  But  now  that  it  has  been  merged  in 
that  general  science  of  evolution,  which  offers  to  an 
unquiet  age  what  seems  a  scientific  licence  to  regard 
as  practically  producible  some  indeterminate  trans- 
formation in  these  processes,  political  economy  has 
come  to  occupy  a  new  position.  Instead  of  being 
ignored  or  ridiculed  by  the  more  ardent  school  of 
reformers,  and  even  neglected  by  conservatives  as  a 
not  very  powerful  auxiliary,  it  has  now  been  brought 
down  into  the  dust  of  the  general  struggle,  and  is 
invoked  by  one  side  as  the  prophetess  of  new 
possibilities,  and  by  the  other  as  an  exorcist  of 
mischievous  and  mad  illusions.  And  what  is  true 
in  this  respect  with  regard  to  political  economy  is 


8  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Chapter  i 


Book  I      aisQ  ^j-yg  ^\)^  regard  to  evolutionary  social  science 


as  a  whole.  Social  science  as  a  whole,  just  like 
this  special  branch  of  it,  is  being  brought  into  vital 
contact  with  the  lives  and  hopes  of  man,  and  is 
exciting  a  popular  interest  strictly  analogous  to  that 
which  had  been  excited  by  physical  and  biological 
science  previously, 
which  will  It   is   doinff   this    in    two   ways,    which,    though 

give  a  religious  ^  t*  rir  i 

meaning  to  the  closely  connectcd,  are  distinct  In  the  first  place, 
humanity,  it  is  directing  our  attention  to  the  human  race  as 
a  whole,  and  is  showing  us  how  society  and  the 
individual  have  developed  in  an  orderly  manner, 
growing  upwards  from  the  lowest  and  the  most 
miserable  beginnings  to  the  heights  of  civilisation, 
intellectual,  moral,  and  material,  and  how  they  con- 
tain in  themselves  the  potency  of  yet  further  develop- 
ment. It  thus  offers  to  the  mind  a  vast  variety  of 
suggestion  with  regard  to  the  significance  of  man's 
presence  upon  the  earth,  and  is  held  by  many  to  be 
supplying  us  with  the  materials  of  a  religion  calcu- 
lated to  replace  that  which  physical  science  has 
discredited.  The  second  way  in  which  it  excites 
or  secure  for    popular   interest   is    the  way  which  has  been  just 

men  now  exist-  .      ^  ,.   .       ,  „ 

ing,  orfor       illustrated  by  a  reference  to  political  economy,     ror 

their  children,    i-i  rr*  l  1"1  i*  i  !•• 

practical  social  bcsidcs  oiiermg  to  our  philosophic  and  religious 
advantages,  faculties  the  visiou  of  man's  corporate  movement  from 
a  condition  of  helpless  bestiality  towards  some  "far- 
off  divine  event,"  which  glitters  on  us  in  the  remote 
future,  social  science  is  suggesting  to  us  changes 
which  are  of  a  very  much  nearer  kind,  and  which 
appeal  not  to  our  speculative  desire  to  discover  some 


THE  PROGRESS   OF  SOCIAL  SCIENCE  9 

meaning  in  the  universe,  but  to  the  personal  interest  ^hrferi 
which  we  each  of  us  take  in  our  own  welfare  —  such, 
for  instance,  as  a  general  redistribution  of  wealth, 
the  abolition  or  complete  reorganisation  of  private 
property,  the  emancipation  of  labour,  and  the 
realisation  of  social  equality. 

This  distinction  between  the  speculative  and  practi-  Men  have  thus 

,  -  .    -         •  ,  •    1   •  a  double  reason 

cal  aspects  01  social  science  has  a  special  importance,  for  being  imer- 
which  will  be  explained  and  insisted  on  presently.  But  science"  and^ 
itis  here  mentioned  only  to  show  the  reader  howstron^  sociologists  a 

J  o  double  reason 

a  combination  of  motives  is  impelling  the  present  for  studying  it; 
generation — the  conservative  classes  and  the  revolu- 
tionary classes  equally — to  transfer  to  social  science 
the  interest  once  felt  in  physical ;  and  how  strong  is  the 
stimulus  thus  applied  to  sociologists  to  emulate  the 
diligence  and  success  of  the  physicists  and  biologists, 
^heir  predecessors.  Nor  have  diligence,  enthusiasm, 
or  scientific  genius  been  wanting  to  them.  As  has 
already  been  observed,  they  have  transformed  social 
science  altos^ether  by  applyinoj  to  it  the  doctrines  of  ^^^ ''  ^^^ 

'^  ^  .  .  attracted  a 

evolution  which  physical  science  taught  them,  and  number  of  men 
have  thus  organically  affiliated  the  former  study  to  have  applied 
the  latter.     This  is  in  itself  a  triumph  worthy  of  the  J^Jthods 
enterprise  that  has  achieved  it.    But  they  have  done  'eamed  in  the 

■*■  ^  ^        •'  school  of  phy- 

far  more  than  borrow  from  physics  this  mere  general  sicai  science. 
theory.  They  have  established  between  physical 
phenomena  and  social  an  enormous  number  of 
analogies,  so  close  that  the  one  set  assists  in  the 
interpretation  of  the  other.  They  have  borrowed 
from  the  physicists  a  number  of  their  subsidiary 
theories,  their  methods  of  grouping  facts,  and,  above 


lo  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Chapter  i 


Book  I      2\\,  their  methods  of  studying  them.    In  a  word,  they 


are  endeavouring  to  follow  the  masters  of  physical 
science  along  the  precise  path  which  has  led  the 
latter  to  such  solid  and  such  definite  results. 
Yet  despite  \\7"e    havc    now,  howcver,    to    record   a   singular 

and  their  diii-  and  disappointing  truth.  Though  men  of  science 
partiescom-  havc,  in  the  manner  just  described,  been  engaged 
Ssultfof  thdr  ^^^  years  in  the  field  of  sociological  study ;  though' 
study  are  in-    thc  way  was  prepared  for  them  by  men  like  Comte, 

conclusive.  . 

Mill,  and  Buckle ;  though  amongst  them  have  been 
men  like  Mr.  Spencer,  with  capacities  of  the  highest 
order,  and  though  certain  results  have  been  reached 
of  the  kind  desired,  complaints  are  heard  from 
thinkers  of  all  shades  of  opinion  that  these  results  are 
singularly  unsatisfactory  and  inconclusive  when  com- 
pared with  the  efforts  that  have  been  made  in  reaching- 
them,  and  still  more  when  compared  with  the  results 
of  corresponding  efforts  in  the  sphere  of  physics. 
Professor  No  ouc  complains  more  loudly  of  this  comparative 

Marshall  and      r    -t  -i  r.i  i'«  'ii  i 

Mr.  Kidd.  for  failure  than  some  or  the  most  distmguished  students 
p£n"of  the""  of  social  scicncc  themselves.  Professor  Marshall, 
fact,  but  can     {qj.  instaucc,  wlio  has  done  more  than    any  other 

suggest  no  ex-  ^  ... 

pianation  of  it.  English  author  to  breathe  into  technical  economics 
the  spirit  of  evolutionary  science,  admits  that  Comte, 
who  laid  the  foundation  of  sociology,  and  Mr. 
Spencer,  who  has  invested  it  with  a  definitely 
scientific  character,  have  brought  to  the  study  of 
*' mans  actions  in  society  U7tsurpassed  knowledge 
and  great  genius,  and  have  made  epochs  in  thought 
by  their  broad  surveys  and  suggestive  hints  " ;  but 
neither  of  them,  he  proceeds  to  say,  has  succeeded 


ALLEGED  FAILURE    OF  SOCIAL  SCIENCE     ii 
in  doing:  more  than  this.     Mr.  Kidd,  ao^ain,  whose     ^?°°^ ' 

o  ^  ^  '      o         '  Chapter  i 

work  on  Social  Evolution,  if  not  valuable  for  the 
conclusions  he  himself  desires  to  substantiate,  is 
curiously  significant  as  an  example  of  contemporary 
sociological  reasoning,  repeats  Professor  Marshall's 
complaint,  and  gives  yet  more  definite  point  to  it. 
Having  observed  that  "  despite  the  great  advaitce 
which  science  has  made  in  almost  every  other  direc- 
tion, there  is,  it  must  be  confessed,  no  science  of  human 
society,  properly  so-called^'  he  justifies  this  observa- 
tion by  insisting  on  what  is  an  undoubted  fact,  that 
*' j^  little  practical  light  has  even  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer 
succeeded  in  throwing  on  the  nature  of  the  social 
problems  of  our  time,  that  his  investigations  and 
conclusions  are,  according  as  they  are  dealt  with  by 
one  side  or  the  other,  held  to  lead  up  to  the  opinions 
of  the  two  diametrically  opposite  camps  of  individ- 
ualists and  collectivists,  into  which  society  is  rapidly 
becoming  organised^ 

Now  what  is  the  reason  of  this?     Here  is  the  what  can  the 

,  ,  1       ,     explanation 

question  that  confronts  us.  Inat  the  methods  be? 
adopted  by  the  scientist  in  the  domain  of  physics 
are  applicable  to  social  phenomena,  just  as  they  are 
to  physical,  has  been  not  only  established  in  a 
broad  and  general  way,  but  demonstrated  by  a  mass 
of  minute  and  elaborately  co-ordinated  facts.  Why, 
then,  when  we  find  them  in  the  sphere  of  physics 
solving  one  problem  after  another  with  a  truly 
surprising  accuracy,  do  they  yield  us  such  vague 
and  often  contradictory  results  when  we  apply  them 
to  the  solution  of  the  practical  problems  of  society  } 


12  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I        V  Those  who  complain  so  j  ustly  of  the  failure  of  social 

science  and  who  yet  show  themselves  altogether  at 

liirbTfound    ^  ^^^^  ^°  account  for  it,  might  have  seen  their  way 

in  the  fact  just  to  answcrino:  this  question  had  they  concentrated 

referred  to—  .^  *       .  .   •'  ,1,1 

that  social       their  attention  on  a  point  that  was  just  now  alluded 
auemptsto      to.     It  was  just  now  obscrvcd  that  the  problems 
dSirctSiof  which   social    science   aims    at   answering,    and   is 
questions;       popularly  cxpectcd  to  answer,  are  of  two  distinct 
kinds  —  the  philosophic  or  religious,  and  the  practi- 
cal ;  the  former  being  concerned  with  the  destinies 
of  humanity  as  a  whole,  with  movements  extending 
over  enormous  periods  of  time,  and  with  the  remote 
past  and  future  far  more  than  with  the  present ;  the 
other  being  concerned  exclusively  with  the  present 
or  the  near  future,  and  with  changes  that  will  affect 
either  ourselves  or  our  own  children, 
and  one  set—      Now  it  wiU  be  fouud  that  social  science,  whilst  busy- 
specuiative—   iug  itsclf  with  both  thcsc  sets  of  problems,  has  met 
wi'Jr^ear'^^'^  with  the  failures  which  are  alleged  against  it,  only 
success;         jj^  dealing  with  the  latter,  and  that,  so  far  as  regards 
the  former,  it  has  successfully  reached  conclusions 
comparable  in  precision  and  solidity  to  those  of  the 
physicists  and  biologists  whose  methods  it  has  so 
conscientiously  followed.     Professor  Marshall's  own 
treatise  on  The  Principles  of  Economics,  and  that  of 
Mr.  Kidd  on  Social  Evolution  likewise,  abound  in 
admissions  that  this  statement  of  the  case  is  correct. 
Professor  Marshall's  account  of  the  rise  and  fall  of 
civilisation  as  caused   by  climate,  by  geographical 
position,  and  the  influence  of   one   race   and  one 
civilisation  on  another,  —  an  account  of  which  he 


SUCCESS   OF  SPECULATIVE  SOCIOLOGY      13 

places  in  the  very  forefront  of  his  elaborate  work  ^°^^ 
—  is  professedly  merely  a  summary  of  conclusions 
already  arrived  at;  and  the  manner  in  which  he 
states  these  conclusions  is  itself  evidence  that 
sociologists,  when  dealing  with  certain  classes  of 
social  phenomena,  have  given  us  something  more 
than  "' surveys  ^^  and  ^^  suggestive  hints ^  Social 
science,  in  fact,  cannot  be  properly  called  a  failure 
except   when    it    ceases    to   deal    with    the    larp^er  >'  i^as  failed 

,  ,  only  in  at- 

phenomena  of  society,  which  show  themselves  only  tempting  to 
in  the  long  course  of  ages,  and  descending  to  the  caf  ques^tSns" 
problems  of  a  particular  age  and  civilisation, 
endeavours  to  deduce,  from  the  general  principles 
it  has  established,  propositions  minute  enough  to 
be  applicable  to  our  immediate  conduct  and  expec- 
tations. As  practical  inquirers,  therefore,  the  real 
question  before  us  is  not  why  social  science  has 
failed,  where  physical  science  has  succeeded,  but 
why  social  science  has  succeeded  like  physical 
science  in  one  direction,  and,  unlike  physical  science, 
failed  so  signally  in  another.  If  we  concentrate  our 
attention  on  the  subject  in  this  way,  and  thus 
realise  with  precision  the  nature  of  the  failure  we 
desire  to  explain,  we  shall  find  that  the  explanation 
of  it  is  not  only  far  simpler  than  might  have  been 
supposed,  but  also  that  the  remedy  for  it  is  far  more 
obvious  and  more  easy. 

It  has  been  said  that  socioloQ^y  has  succeeded  in  No^the 

«-'•'  ^  phenomena 

dealing  with  those  social  phenomena  which  extend  with  which 

....  .     .  it  has  dealt 

themselves  through  vast  periods  01    time,  and  has  successfully 
failed   in    dealing  with    those  whose    interest   and  mena^ofTodai 


14  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

fiooki      existence  is  limited   to   lives   of   a  few  particular 

Chapter  I  .  i  i  r 

generations.      Now    between    these    two    sets    of 
aggregates      phenomena,  as   thus   far   described,  the   most   ob- 

considered  as-"^  .  iiiiTr  -i' 

wholes;  vious  difference  is,  no  doubt,  the  difference  in  their 

magnitude.  This  difference,  however,  is  altogether 
accidental,  and  does  nothing  to  explain  those  curi- 
ously contrasted  results  which  the  study  of  one  set 
and  the  other  has  yielded  to  the  modern  sociologist. 
The  difference,  which  will  explain  these,  is  of  quite 
another  kind,  and  may  briefly  be  stated  thus.  The 
larger  social  phenomena  —  those  which  interest  the 
speculative  philosopher,  and  with  which  sociology 
has  dealt  successfully,  are  phenomena  of  social 
aggregates,  or  masses  of  men  regarded  as  single 
bodies;  the  smaller  phenomena  —  those  which  in- 
terest the  practical  man,  and  with  which  sociology 
has  dealt  unsuccessfully  —  are  essentially  the  pheno- 
mena not  of  social  aggregates,  but  of  various  parts 
of  aggregates. 

Let  us  illustrate  the  matter  provisionally  by  two 
rudimentary  examples.  As  an  example  of  the  larger 
phenomena  let  us  take  the  advance  of  man  from  the 
age  of  stone  to  the  ages  of  bronze  and  iron.  Of  the 
smaller,  we  may  take  the  phenomena  referred  to  by 
Mr.  Kidd  —  namely,  the  appearance  in  the  modern 
world  of  the  socialist  or  collectivist  party,  and  the 
antagonism  between  it  and  the  party  of  private  prop- 
erty and  individualism.  Now  the  first  of  these  two 
sets  of  phenomena  —  the  use  by  men  of  stone  imple- 
ments, and  the  subsequent  use  of  metal  implements 
— consist  of  phenomena  which,  so  far  as  the  sociolo- 


FAILURE    OF  PRACTICAL  SOCIOLOGY         15 
jglst   is   concerned,  are  manifested  successively  by      boo^  i 

,  .  ,  .    .  .  ,      -  -'        Chapter  i 

humanity,  or  some  portion  or  humanity,  as  a  whole. 

They  are  not  referred  to  individuals  or  small  classes. 

No  question  is  asked  as  to  what  particular  savage 

may  rightly  claim  priority  in  the  invention  of  metal 

implements,  or  whether  flint  or   bronze  were   the 

subjects  of  any  prehistoric  monopoly.     Those  races 

amongst  which  the  use  of  the  metals  became  general 

are  regarded  as  a  single  body,  which  had  made  this 

advance  collectively.     They  are,  indeed,  as  we  shall 

again  have  occasion  to  observe,  habitually  described 

under  the  common  name  of  Man.     But  let  us  turn  t>ut  the  practi- 

to   such   phenomena   as   the   antagonism   between  of  to-day.  with 

individualists  and  collectivists,  and  the  case  is  wholly  deaSfunilS 

different.     It  is  true  that  here  also,  as  in  the  case  ^"'^"i^y*  ^"'^ 

out  of  the  con- 

we  have   just   been    considering,  our   attention    is  fl'ct  between 

,1      ,  •  r      1         1  11       different  parts 

called  to  a  portion  or  the  human  race,  namely,  the  of  aggregates. 
Western  or  progressive  nations,  which  we  may,  for 
certain  purposes,  regard  as  a  single  aggregate ;  but 
it  is  fixed,  not  on  the  phenomena  which  this  ag- 
gregate exhibits  as  a  whole,  but  on  those  exhibited 
by  unlike  and  conflicting  parts  of  it  —  the  part  which 
sympathises  with  individualists  on  the  one  hand, 
and  the  part  which  sympathises  with  collectivists 
on  the  other. 

Thus  the  subject-matter  of  sociology,  regarded 
as  a  speculative  science,  consists  of  those  points 
in  which  the  members  of  any  given  social  aggre- 
gate resemble  one  another.  The  subject-matter 
of  sociology,  regarded  as  a  practical  science, 
consists  of  those  points  in  which  the  members,  or 


i6  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I      certain   groups   of   members,   of   any  given   social 

aggregate  differ  from  one  another.     And  here  we 

come  to  the  reason  why  sociology,  as  a  practical 

Social  success  scicncc,  has  failed.     It  has  failed  because  hitherto 

has  failed  as  a.  ,.,,.,..  .  ..  .  . 

practical  guide  it  has  not  rcalised  this  distmction,  and  has  persisted 

notTe'cVgnised  in  applying  to  the  phenomena,  involved  in  practical 

thisdistinc-     social   problems,  the  same  terminology,  the  same 

methods  of  observation  and  reasoning,  which  it  has 

applied  to  the  phenomena  involved  in  speculative 

social  problems.     By  so  doing,  though  it  has  dis- 

sipated  many  popular  errors,   it  has,  in  the  most 

singular  manner,  given  a  new  vitality  to  others.     It 

has  indeed  supplied  a  pseudo-scientific  sanction  to  the 

most  abject  fallacies  that  have  vitiated  the  political 

philosophy  of  this  century;   and  it  has  thus  been 

and  hence       instrumental    in    keeping    alive    and   encouraging 

arise  most  of  ,       .  m  i       i  j.  i      ^ 

the  errors  of    thc  most  grotcsqucly  impossible  hopes  as  to  what 

iJTiiosophy'of  nnay  be  accomplished  by  legislation,  and  the  most 

tiiis  century,     grotcsqucly  false  views  as  to  the  sources  of  social 

and  political  power.     To  expose  these  fallacies,  and 

the  defective  reasoning  on  which  they  rest,  is  the 

object  of  the  present  volume. 

The  nature  of  that  peculiarity  in  the  procedure 
of  modern  sociology  which  has  just  been  described, 
and  to  which  all  its  errors  are  due,  forms  a  very 
curious  study,  and  it  will  be  essential  to  exhibit  it 
with  the  utmost  plainness  possible.  In  the  following 
chapter,  therefore,  the  reader  shall  be  presented  with 
examples  of  it. 


CHAPTER  II 


THE  ATTEMPT  TO  MERGE  THE  GREAT  MAN  IN 
THE  AGGREGATE 

Let  us  take  any  book  we  please,  by  any  modern  whatever  may 

,         .        -^  .  1       ,         .  ,  •    1  be  done  by 

writer,  who  is  attempting  to  deal  with  any  social  some  men.  or 

i»,  •i'r'11  1         1  1  •  11*  classes  of  men, 

subject   scientincally,  and  whenever   he    is   calling  sociologists  are 

attention  to  the  great  intellectual  triumphs  which  ^^.P^yj^'^^^^ 

have  caused  the  progress  of  civilisation,  or  to  any  attribute  to 

developments  of  human  nature  which  have  marked 

it,  we  shall  find  that  these  triumphs  or  developments 

are  always  attributed  indiscriminately  to  the  largest 

mass  of  people  with  whom  they  have  any  connection 

—  sometimes  to  "  the   nation,"  sometimes  to  "  the 

age,"  sometimes  to  "  the  race,"  and  more  frequently 

still  to  "  man." 

Reference  has  been  made  already  to  Mr.  Kidd's  wn  Kidd's 

"'.  ,  ,  Social  Evolu- 

work  on  Social  Evolution^  which,  on  its  publication,  Hon,  for  in- 

•         •  ..  !•,  ii'i      Stance,  is  based 

attained  an  extraordinary  popularity,  and  which,  entirely  on  this 
whatever  its  value  otherwise,  is  interesting  as  a  p''°"'^"''^- 
type  of  contemporary  sociological  reasoning.  It  is 
peculiarly  interesting  as  illustrating  the  point  which 
we  are  now  discussing.  Most  of  Mr.  Kidd's 
reasoning,  especially  in  the  crucial  parts  of  it,  is  not 
2  17 


i8  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I      only  conducted,  but  is   actually  represented   by  a 

terminology  which  refers  everything  to  "  the  race," 

"the  age,"  or   "man."     And  it  would    be  hard  to 

find   better  examples   in    the  works   of   any  other 

writer  of  the  condition  of  thought  underlying  the 

use   of    these   phrases,   and   of    the   extraordinary 

consequences  to  which  it  leads. 

Hequoteswith      Three  cxamplcs  will  be  enough.     The  two  first 

oufeTwriters    shall  be  from  two  other  writers,  whom  Mr.  Kidd 

gumy  of  it!"''"  quotes  with  admiration;   the   third   shall  be  from 

himself.     We  will  begin  with  the  following  passage, 

taken  from  a  contemporary  economist,  which  Mr. 

Kidd  singles  out  for  emphatic  approval  as  "  a  very 

effective  statement''  of   one   of   the  truths  of  social 

science. 

"  Manl'  so  the  passage  runs,  "  is  the  07ily  animal 
whose  wants  can  never  be  satisfied.  The  wants  of 
every,  other  living  thiiig  are  uniform,  and  fixed. 
The  ox  of  to-day  aspires  no  more  than  did  the  ox 
when  ma7i  first  yoked  him.  .  .  .  But  not  so  with 
man  \_himself~\.  No  sooner  are  his  animal  wants 
satisfied,  than  new  wants  arise.  .  .  .  [//^]  has  but  set 
his  feet  on  the  first  step  of  a^t  infinite  progression. 
...  //  is  not  m,erely  his  hu7tger^  but  taste,  that 
seeks  gratification  in  food.  .  .  .  Lucullus  will  sup 
with  Lucullus;  twelve  boars  roast  on  spits  that 
Antony  s  mouthful  of  meat  may  be  done  to  a  turn  ; 
every  kingdom  is  ransacked  to  add  to  Cleopatra  s 
charms;  and  marble  colonnades,  and  hanging 
gardens,  and  pyramids  that  rival  the  hills,  arise'' 
This  passage  is  taken  from  Mr.  Henry  George. 


TYPES   OF  ERRONEOUS  REASONING  19 

Our  second  example  shall  be  a  passage  which  Mr.  ^oo^  i 
Kidd  has  borrowed  from  a  far  more  educated 
thinker — M.  Emile  de  Lavelaye.  Mr.  Kidd  quotes 
M.  de  Lavelaye  as  saying  that  the  eighteenth 
century  brought  the  following  message  to  ''man.'* 
"  Thou  shall  cease  to  be  the  slave  of  the  nobles  and 
despots  who  oppress  thee.  Thou  shall  be  free  and 
sovereign^  But  the  realisation  of  the  promise  thus 
given  has,  in  the  present  century,  he  goes  on  to 
say,  confronted  us  with  this  strange  problem. 
" How  is  it  that  the  Sovereign  often  starves?  How 
is  it  that  those  who  are  held  to  be  the  source  of 
power  often  cannot^  even  by  hard  work^  provide 
themselves  with  the  necessaries  of  life  1  " 

Now  all  these  passasres,  if  we  consider  them  care- '^^°  ^°*^ 

•11    1  •  r  attribute  to 

fully,  will  be  seen  to  consist  of  statements,  every  one  man  what  is 
of  which  is  false  to  fact.  To  say  that  man's  wants  a°few  Jen"  ^ 
are  less  stationary  than  those  of  the  ox  is  not  even 
rhetorically  true,  unless  we  mean  by  "  man  "  certain 
special  races  of  men;  whilst  the  statements  that 
follow  are  not  true,  rhetorically  or  otherwise,  of  any 
race  at  all,  but  only  of  scattered  individuals.  A 
really  fine  and  discriminating  taste  in  food  is,  as 
every  epicure  knows,  rare  even  amongst  the  luxu- 
rious classes.  Antony  and  Lucullus  are  types  of 
what  is  not  the  rule,  but  the  exception.  So  too 
are  the  individuals  who  either  desire  hanging  gar- 
dens, or  could  design  them ;  and  more  exceptional 
still  are  the  individuals  whose  personal  pride  and 
power  either  desire  or  can  secure  the  erection  of 
pyramids  for  their  tombs. 


20  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I  jn    M.   de    Lavelaye's    utterances    there    is    an 

Chapter  2  .  .  , 

analogous  misstatement  and  misconception  of  every 
s^'ll'Jfcw^o  ^^^^  '^^^^  which  he  deals.  The  promises  of  politi- 
their  reasoning  cal   dcmocracv,  as  he   dcscribcs  them,  were  never 

are  ludicrous.  i  »  c  ^  ^  t'i 

addressed  to  "  ma7i,  nor  ever  professed  to  be.  1  he 
whole  point  of  them  was  that  they  were  addressed 
to  certain  classes  of  men  only ;  and  that,  as  addressed 
to  other  classes,  they  were  not  promises,  but 
threats.  But  a  still  graver  confusion  arises  when 
the  "  Sovereign "  is  spoken  of  as  starving.  If  by 
the  "  Sovereign "  M.  de  Lavelaye  really  means 
"  Man  "  as  a  whole,  it  is  perfectly  obvious  that  the 
"  Sovereign "  never  starves.  The  statement  is 
equally  untrue  if  the  Sovereign  is  taken  to  mean 
not  man  as  a  whole,  but  the  immense  majority  of 
men;  and  to  ask  why  the  Sovereign  often  does 
something  which  it  never  does,  is  not  to  formulate 
an  actual  problem  loosely,  but  to  convert  an  actual 
problem  into  one  that  is  quite  imaginary.  The 
actual  problem  is  not  why  the  whole  or  the  immense 
majority  of  mankind  often  starves,  but  why  there 
are  nearly  always  small  sections  of  men  who  do  so, 
the  majority  all  the  while  obtaining  its  normal 
nutriment ;  and  the  absurd  result  of  confusing  these 
two  very  different  things  is  seen  in  the  second  form 
which  M.  de  Lavelaye  gives  his  question.  "  How 
is  it"  he  asks,  "  that  those  who  are  held  to  be  the 
source  of  power  often  ca7i7iot,  even  by  hard  work, 
provide  themselves  with  the  necessaries  of  life  ? " 
The  answer  is  that  the  particular  groups  of  workers 
who,  at  any  given  time,  happen  to  be  unemployed. 


THE  ERRORS   OF  MR.  KIDD  21 

were  never  held  to  be  the  source  of  power  by  any-  Book  i 
body.  M.  de  Lavelaye  might  as  well  take  one 
half  of  the  passengers  on  a  Dover  packet,  and 
treating  them  as  identical  with  the  British  nation 
at  large,  ask  how  it  is  that  those  who  are  held  to 
rule  the  waves  can  hardly  set  foot  on  a  deck  with- 
out clamouring  for  the  steward's  basin. 

And  now  let  us  turn  to  Mr.  Kidd  himself.     The  "^^^  ^^'^^'^ 

.  •      T  reasoning  itself 

object   of    his    book    is    to   vindicate   supernatural  is  not  less 
religion    by  exhibiting   it   as   advantageous    to    its  fiist^harfofhis 
possessors  in  the  social  struggle  for  existence.     He  Jlft^Son 
endeavours  to  make  good  his  position  by  two  distinct  p^mpts  the 

,  few  to  sur- 

lines  of  argument.     The  first  of  these  is  that  the  render  advan- 
social  struggle    for   existence,  though    it   produces  many,  which, 
progressive  communities,  and  communities  fitted  to  lo*do^so!'t'hey 
endure,  is  injurious  to  the  majority  of  those  who  at  ^^'^^'^  ^"p- 
any  given  time  are  engaged  in  it,  and  benefits  only 
a  minority,  described  by  him  as  "  the  power- holding 
classes^     This  minority,  according  to  his  account, 
could  always,  if  it  pleased,  as  it  has  pleased  in  all 
former    ages,    defend    its    position    and    keep    the 
majority  in  subjection ;    but   it   is    now  beginning, 
under    the    pressure    of    a    religious    impulse,    to 
surrender    to    its    inferiors   voluntarily   advantages 
which  they  could  never  have  extorted  from  it;  and 
in  this  great  fact  our  hope  for  the  future  lies. 

Such  is  one  of   the    two  main    portions  of    Mr.  The  second 

'■  half  is  that  the 

Kidd's  message  to  the  world;   and  here  follows  the  many  at  any 
other,  which    will    be   found    to   be   fundamentally  hTve  taken 
inconsistent  with  it.     ''Man,'  if  he  had  chosen  to  J^^^J  ^f;^";j^^ 
do    so,    Mr.    Kidd   maintains  —  and   this   assertion 


22 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  I 
Chapter  2 

few,  and  that 
religion  alone 
prevented 
them  from 
doing  so. 


This  contra- 
diction is 
entirely  due  to 
the  fact  that, 
having  first 
divided  the 
social  aggre- 
gate into  two 
classes,  he  then 
obliterates  his 
division,  and 
thinks  of  them 
both  as 
"  man." 


is  repeated  by  him  with  the  utmost  precision 
and  emphasis  —  could  at  any  period  in  his  history 
have  "  suspended  the  struggle  for  existe^ice "  and 
"  organised  society  on  a  socialistic  basis " ;  and 
seeing  that  the  struggle  for  existence,  although 
essential  to  progress  in  the  long-run,  is  injurious 
to  the  majority  of  each  generation  that  takes  part 
in  it,  man,  if  his  chief  guide  had  been  reason  or 
self-interest,  would  have  been  suspending  this 
struggle  constantly  for  the  sake  of  his  own  present 
advantage,  and  leaving  the  future  to  take  care  of  it- 
self. Now,  seeing  that  he  does  not,  as  a  fact,  pursue 
this  obviously  reasonable  course,  it  follows  that  some 
power  opposed  to  reason  must  have  withheld  him ; 
and  this  power,  argues  Mr.  Kidd,  can  be  nothing 
else  than  religion.  Here,  he  says,  are  the  two 
functions  of  religion  in  evolution.  It  induces  man 
to  submit  to  the  hardships  of  the  evolutionary 
struggle,  at  the  same  time  it  redeems  him  from 
them  by  softening  the  hearts  of  the  minority. 

Now  with  Mr.  Kidd's  views  about  religion  we 
have  nothing  to  do  here.  We  are  concerned  only 
with  the  extraordinary  self-contradiction  involved 
in  these  his  principal  lines  of  argument,  and  also 
with  the  cause  which  has  led  to  it,  and  made  it 
possible.  At  one  moment  he  says  that  the  majority 
in  all  progressive  communities  have  been  forced  to 
submit  to  conditions  of  life  that  are  prejudicial  to 
them,  by  a  powerful  minority  to  whom  these  con- 
ditions are  beneficial,  and  who,  if  they  chose  to 
do  so,  would  still  be  able  to  maintain  them.     At 


THE  ERRORS   OF  MR.  KIDD  23 

another  moment  he  says  that  this  surprisingly  patient  ^°°^  ^ 
majority  could  have  easily  "  suspended  these  condi- 
tions "  at  any  period  of  its  history,  and  only  failed 
to  do  so  because  religion  prompted  it  to  forbear. 
How  a  contradiction  of  this  kind  could  have  found 
its  way  into  the  reasoning  of  a  really  painstaking 
thinker,  and  been  actually  allowed  to  form  the  back- 
bone of  it,  may  at  first  sight  seem  inexplicable ;  but 
it  is  simply  a  typical  result  of  the  practice  we  are 
now  considering — that  practice,  common  to  all  our 
modern  sociologists,  of  grouping  the  men  they  deal 
with  into  the  largest  aggregate  possible,  and  treating 
mixed  classes  of  men  as  one  single  class  —  ''majir 

It  is  easy  to  see  precisely  how  Mr.  Kidd's  mind 
has  worked.  In  the  first  part  of  his  argument  he 
divides  progressive  communities  into  two  sections, 
which  he  calls  respectively  "  the  power-holding 
classes "  or  the  " success/uls"  and  the  " excluded 
classes  "  or  the  "  unsuccessftils  " ;  and  he  declares 
that  the  latter  would  naturally  desire  to  suspend 
the  conditions  of  progress,  whilst  the  former  would 
naturally  desire,  and  are  also  able  to  maintain  them. 
But  when  he  pushes  his  argument  farther,  and 
advances  to  the  proposition  that  if  reason  had  been 
** mans "  sole  guide,  the  conditions  of  progress  would 
have  been  suspended  over  and  over  again,  he  is 
enabled  to  take  this  extraordinary  step  only  because 
his  thought  and  his  terminology  undergo  an  un- 
conscious metamorphosis.  He  forgets  his  original 
analysis  altogether.  He  merges  the  two  classes,  so 
sharply  contrasted  by  him,  into  one.     He  argues  and 


24 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  I 
Chapter  2 


Mr.  Kidd's 
confusion  is 
the  result  of 
no  accidental 
error.    It  is 
the  inevitable 
result  of  a 
radically 
fallacious 
method, 


and  of  this 
method  the 
chief  exponent 
is  Mr.  Herbert 
Spencer, 


thinks  about  them  both,  under  the  single  category 
of  "  man  " ;  he  builds  up  his  conclusions  by  joining 
together  the  very  things  which,  in  arranging  his 
premises,  he  had  so  carefully  put  asunder ;  and  the 
result  of  his  speculation  reduced  to  its  simplest 
terms  is  this  —  that  "  man  "  could  have  done,  at  any 
period  of  his  history,  and,  if  reason  had  been  his 
sole  guide,  actually  would  have  done,  something  that 
was  against  the  interests  of  the  stronger  part  of 
him,  and  beyond  the  power  of  the  weaker. 

The  reader  will  not  find  much  difficulty  in  under- 
standing that  if  sociologists  persist  in  reasoning 
thus,  they  are  hardly  likely  to  arrive  at  any  con- 
clusion sufficiently  definite  to  guide  us  in  the 
practical  difficulties  of  life.  It  may  be  urged, 
however,  that  such  language  as  we  have  been 
considering,  though  used  by  scientific  writers,  is 
intended  itself  to  be  rhetorical  rather  than  scientific, 
or  that  it  betrays  the  inaccuracy  of  this  or  that 
individual  thinker,  instead  of  arising  from  a  funda- 
mental error  in  method.  If  any  one  thinks  this, 
he  shall  soon  be  disabused  of  his  opinion.  The 
reader  shall  now  be  presented  with  a  brief  summary 
of  the  method  deliberately  followed,  and  of  some  of 
the  conclusions  arrived  at  by  that  distinguished 
thinker  who  has  done  more  than  any  one  else  to 
impart  to  sociology  the  character  which  it  at  present 
possesses ;  and  the  error  which  lies  at  the  bottom  of 
the  reasoning  we  have  been  just  considering  shall 
there  be  exhibited,  systematically  exemplified,  and 
explicitly  and  elaborately  defended.     It  is  perhaps 


MR.  SPENCER'S  FUNDAMENTAL  FALLACY    25 
hardly  necessary  to  say  that  the  thinker  thus  referred      ^°°'^ ' 

•'  10  Chapter  2 

to  is  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer. 

We   will   then   follow    Mr.   Spencer's   reasoning  as  a  short 

,..  ri'i'  1  1  summary  of 

from  the  beginning,  as  set  forth  in  his  works;  and  his  sociological 
before  consulting  his  monumental  Principles  ^show?^"'^ '"" 
Sociology^  we  will  turn  to  his  Study  of  Sociology^ 
a  smaller  and  preparatory  treatise,  in  which  the 
methods  adopted  by  him  in  his  main  inquiry  are 
explained.  He  opens  this  treatise  with  declaring 
that  until  recent  years  any  scientific  treatment  of 
social  phenomena  was  impossible ;  and  it  was  im- 
possible, he  says,  for  two  definite  reasons.  These 
were  the  prevalence  of  two  utterly  false  theories, 
both  of  which  precluded  the  idea  that  anything  like 
law  or  order  of  a  calculable  kind  were  prevalent  in 
the  social  sphere.  One  of  these  theories  was  "  the 
theocratic  theory^'  the  other  what  he  calls  "  the 
great-man  theory^ 

The  theocratic  theory  is  that  which  explains  all  M"".  spencer 

starts  with 

social  change  by  reference  to  the  direct  and  arbitrary  saying  that  the 
interference  of  a  Deity;  and  if  this  be  adopted,  Mr.  mentto?ociai 
Spencer  has  no  difficulty  in  showing:  that  anything  ^'='^"<;^  '^  '^« 

A  J  c>  J  Q  prevalence  of 

like  a  social  science  must  be  necessarily  looked  on  *he  great-man 
as  impossible :  for  the  only  thread  by  which  social 
phenomena  are  connected  will  in  that  case  be  hid- 
den in  the  will  of  an  inscrutable  Being,  which  may 
indeed  be  made  known  to  us  by  revelation,  but 
which  is  not  susceptible  of  being  either  observed 
or  calculated.  This  theory,  however,  in  its  cruder 
form,  at  all  events,  is,  says  Mr.  Spencer,  being  fast 
discarded  by  everybody  —  even  by  the  theologically 


26  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I      orthodox ;  and  the  really  important  foe  which  social 

Chapter  2  .  ,  r     i  •  •       i 

science  has  to  fight  against  is  the  great-man  theory, 
not  the  theocratic.  Accordingly,  it  is  by  a  criticism 
of  the  great-man  theory  that  he  introduces  us  to  the 
theory  of  society,  which  is  in  his  estimation  true, 
and  which  alone  presents  social  phenomena  to  us 
as  amenable  to  scientific  treatment. 

The  great-man  theory  is  summed  up  by  him  in 
the  following  quotation  from  Carlyle:  ''As  I  take 
it,  universal  history,  the  history  of  what  Tnan  has 
accomplished  in  this  world,  is  at  bottom  the  history 
of  the  great  7nen  who  have  worked  here'.'  "  This,'* 
observes  Mr.  Spencer,  "  not  perhaps  distinctly  for- 
mulated, but  everywhere  implied,  is  the  belief  in 
which  nearly  all  are  brought  up " ;  and  it  is,  he 
declares,  as  incompatible  as  the  theocratic  theory 
itself  with  any  belief  in  the  possibility  of  a  social 
science,  or  any  comprehension  of  what  such  a 
science  is;  for  either  the  great  man  is  regarded 
as  the  miraculous  instrument  of  the  Deity,  a  kind 
foriftheap-     of    '' dcputv-God,"   in    which   case   we   have   '' theo- 

pearance  of  ■'        -^ 


the  great  man  cracy  oncc  removed" ;  or  else  his  greatness,  though 

is  incalculable,  .     .  <  i        i  •  11 

progress,  if  it    regarded  as  a  natural  phenomenon,  is  regarded  as 

hfm^mus°be    ^nc  whosc   occurrcncc  is  so  far  fortuitous,  that  a 

mcaicuiabie     great  man  of  any  given   kind  of  greatness  might 

appear  in  one  age  or   nation   just   as  well   as  in 

another ;  and  in  this  case,  if  social  changes  depend 

on  the  great  man's  actions,  these  changes  will  be  as 

fortuitous  as  the  great  man's  own  appearance,  and 

will  as  little  admit  of  any  scientific  calculation. 

If,   however,   the   great    man   is   regarded  as   a 


MR.  SPENCER   ON  GREAT  MEN  27 

natural  phenomenon  at  all,  if  he  is  not  to  be  looked    ^?°°^  ^ 

^  _  _  •  .      .  Chapter  2 

upon  as  a  species  of  incalculable  angel,  this  idea  of 

his   fortuitous   appearance   is,   says    Mr.    Spencer,  tut  if  the  great 

T'l  1       vi\2in  is  not  a 

plainly  quite  untenable.  The  great  man,  unless  he  miraculous 
differs  miraculously  from  other  men,  is  produced  as  owerh/s^grert- 
they  are,  in  accordance  with  natural  laws,  and,  like  outsid°e  him" 
them,  owes  his  greatness  to  his  near  and  remote  ^eif; 
progenitors,  just  as  a  negro  owes  to  his,  his  facial 
angle,  his  blackness,  and  his  woolly  hair.  "  Who 
would  expect,''  Mr.  Spencer  asks,  "  that  a  Newton 
might  be  born  of  a  Hottentot  family,  or  that  a 
Milton  might  spring  up  amo7ig  the  Andamanese?  " 
The  theory,  then,  which  explains  social  changes  by 
referring  them  to  the  great  men  whose  names  are 
connected  with  their  initiation,  will,  unless  it  is 
regarded  as  a  theory  of  perpetual  miracle,  be 
recognised  as  inadequate,  even  by  those  who  have 
hitherto  held  it,  when  once  they  have  realised  the 
absurd  supposition  which  it  implies.  The  great 
man,  whatever  his  seeming  influence,  is  merely  the 
agent  of  other  influences  which  are  behind  him. 
He  merely  transmits  a  shock,  like  a  man  pushed 
by  a  crowd.  Even  supposing  what  Mr.  Spencer 
entirely  denies  to  be  the  case,  that  he  could  really  ^"^  ^*  ^^^'^"^ 

J  •'   causes  winch 

"  remake  his  society  I'  his  society  none  the  less  must  reaiiy  produce 
have  previously  made  him,  and  supplied  him  with  which  he  is  the 
those  conditions  which  rendered  his  career  possible;  fnitiator.*^ 
and  therefore,  of  any  changes  which  he  may  popu- 
larly be   said   to   have  caused,  he   is   merely  ''the 
proximate  initiator',''  not  the  true  cause  at  all ;  and 
"  if  I'  says   Mr.  Spencer,  "  there  is  to  be  anything 


28  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

BooJt  I  like  a  real  explmtation  of  such  changes^  it  must  be 
sought  {not  in  the  great  man  himself\  but  in  the 
aggregate  of  social  conditio7is^  out  of  which  he  and 
they  have  arisen.'''  Except,  perhaps,  in  the  military 
struggles  of  primitive  savage  tribes,  "  new  institu- 
tions^ new  activities,  new  ideas^  all,''  he  says, 
These  effects,   «'  unobtrusivclv  make  their  appearance,  without  the 

therefore,  are  .  .        .  .  .  i       •    j  i     •  r  •    7 

to  be  explained  aid  of  any  king  or  legislator ;  and  if  you  wish  to 
notToThegreat  Understand  the  phenomena  of  social  evolution,  you 
tlircauses^hat  ^^^'^  '^^^  ^^  ^^'  ^^ould  you  read  yourself  blind  over 
are  behind  the  /^^  biozrapMcs  of  all  the  z^cat  rulers  on  record. 

great  man.  . 

down  to  Frederick  the  Greedy,  and  Napoleon  the 
Treacherous'.'  And  he  points  his  moral  by  observ- 
ing, with  a  certain  philosophic  tartness,  that  there  is 
no  surer  index  of  a  man's  '*  mental  sanity  "  than  the 
degree  of  contempt  which,  as  a  scientific  thinker, 
he  feels  for  the  class  of  facts  which  the  biography 
of  individuals  offers  him. 

Such,  then,  being  Mr.  Spencer's  theory  of  the 
way  in  which  social  phenomena  must  be  re- 
garded, if  we  mean  to  make  them  the  subject 
of  anything  like  scientific  study,  let  us  turn  to  his 
m,agnum  opus.  The  Principles  of  Sociology,  and  see 
how,  and  with  what  results,  he  puts  his  theory  of 
study  into  practice.  This  immense  work,  full  of 
encyclopaedic  detail  as  it  is,  contains  certain  general 
and  comparatively  simple  conclusions,  which  can 
with  sufficient  clearness  be  expressed  in  a  short 
summary,  and  which  are  typical  of  the  character 
and  the  contents  of  Mr.  Spencer's  sociology  as  a 
whole.     These   general   conclusions   constitute   in 


NATURE  AND  SOCIAL  PROGRESS  29 

outline  the  entire  history  of  human  progress  from      ^0°'^  ^ 
the  dawn  of  man's  existence  to  the  industrial  civili- 
sation of  to-day. 

The  determining  factors  in  all  social  phenomena  Thetmecauses 

.  1   •      1  1       of  all  social 

are,  says  Mr.  bpencer,  primarily  or  two  kinds  —  the  phenomena 
"  external''''  and  the  "  internair     The  former  consist  sp^encer^, 
of   some  of   the  various  physical  circumstances  in  J'^^^g^tand* 
which   each   community   or   collection    of   men    is  "^^^'s  natural 

•'    ,  character. 

placed;  the  latter  consist  of  the  characters  and 
constitutions  of  the  men  themselves.  In  the  his- 
tory of  each  community  the  chief  of  the  external 
factors  are  these :  the  climate  of  the  region  which 
the  community  occupies;  the  cultivability  of  this 
region ;  its  geological  and  geographical  character ; 
the  way  in  which  the  fauna  and  flora  natural  to  it 
are  distributed;  and  the  character  of  the  other 
communities  by  which  the  community  in  question 
is  surrounded.  One  of  the  first  generalisations, 
says  Mr.  Spencer,  to  which  social  science  leads  isT^^^i'st 

,  .  ,  ,         .  .  .  physical  cause 

this  —  that  progress  can  begin  only  in  climates  and  of  progress  was 

,  , ,  1        , .  r    ,^  •  /•  an  exceptional 

regions  where  the  production  or  the  necessaries  of  fertility  of  soil 
life  is  sufficiently  easy  to  leave  men  leisure  and  en- . 
ergy  available  for  other  work ;  and  all  progress  did 
as  a  fact  begin  in  those  parts  of  the  earth  where  the 
maintenance  of  life  was  easy. 

He  goes  on  to  show,  however,  that  the  initiation  andanexcep- 

.  tionally  brac- 

of  progress  does  not  require  only  that  the  men  con- ing  climate, 
cerned  in  it  should  inhabit  a  region  in  which  the 
production  of  necessaries  is  easy  and  leaves  them 
abundant  leisure.     It  is  equally  essential  that  the 
men  themselves  should  possess  an  energetic  tem- 


30 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  I 
Chapter  2 


All  the  con- 
quering races 
came  from 
fertile  and 
bracing 
regions. 


There  were 
other  regions 
yet  more 
fertile,  but 
these  were 
enervating ; 
and  here  the 
inhabitants  of 
the  former 
enslaved  the 
weaker  inhabi 
tants  of  the 
latter. 


perament,  which  will  not  suffer  them  to  devote  their 
leisure  to  idleness,  but  will  make  it  the  starting- 
point  for  some  further  activity.  Now  this  energetic 
temperament  is  the  special  gift  of  climate.  So,  to 
a  great  extent,  is  the  ease  with  which  necessaries 
are  obtained  from  the  soil ;  but  whilst  the  fertility 
of  the  soil  is  dependent  on  the  climate  being  hot, 
the  requisite  energetic  temperament  is  dependent 
on  the  climate  being  dry.  "  The  evidence^'  says 
Mr.  Spencer,  "-justifies  this  inference.  .  .  .  On 
glanci7ig  over  a  ge7ieral  rain-map  of  the  worlds  there 
will  be  seen  an  almost  continuous  area^  marked 
"■  rainless  district^  extendi^tg  across  North  Africa^ 
Arabia,  Persia,  and  all  through  Thibet  and  Mon- 
golia ;  and  from  within,  or  from  the  borders  of  this 
district,  have  come  all  the  conquering  races  of  the 
Old  World: 

But  the  full  operation  of  climate  on  human  prog- 
ress is  not  intelligible  till  a  further  climatic  fact  is 
considered.  Though  in  hot  and  dry  climates  the 
production  of  necessaries  is  easy,  in  climates  that 
are  hot  and  moist  their  production  is  still  easier. 
It  is  these  last  that  are  really  the  gardens  of  the 
world,  and  that  offered  to  primeval  man  the  easiest 
and  most  attractive  homes.  The  original  inhabi- 
tants, however,  of  these  favoured  localities  not  only 
profited  by  their  conditions,  but  also  ultimately 
suffered  from  them.  Whilst  the  fertility  of  their 
habitat  pampered  them,  its  moisture  destroyed  their 
energy;  and  in  process  of  time  they  were  subju- 
gated by  other  races,  who,  cradled  in  dryer  climates, 


ORIGIN  OF  INDUSTRIAL    CIVILISATION       31 
retained  their  enero^y  unimpaired.     In  this  natural      Booki 

T  '    T  /      Chapter  2 

descent  of  the  stronger  races  on  "  the  richer  and 
more  varied  habitats  "  of  the  weaker,  and  the  conse- 
quent super-position  of  one  race  over  another,  we 
see  the  origin  of  slavery,  and  of  all  the  ancient 
civilisations  that  reposed  upon  it. 

We  have  here  the  three  essential  elements  to  the 
union  of  which  primarily  all  human  progress  has 
been  due:  Firstly,  a  race  remarkable  for  its  active 
energy ;  secondly,  the  appropriation  by  this  race  of 
some  richer  habitat  than  its  own;  and  thirdly, 
the  possession  by  it  of  an  inferior  race,  as  subjects, 
who  are  ready  to  work  for  its  benefit,  and  are 
capable,  when  coerced  and  directed  by  it,  of  pro- 
ducing wealth  indefinitely  greater  and  more  varied 
than  they  would  or  could  have  produced  had  they 
been  left  to  their  own  devices. 

And  here  we  are  brought  to  the  threshold  of  a  Again,  division 
new  order  of  facts.     Industrial  production,  which  is  which  indus- 
the  basis  of  all  civilisation,  is  not,  says  Mr.  Spencer,  d"peSd°^was 
started   on   its   progressive   career   by  the    sudden  ""^^'^  ^y  ^l'^ 

i^       O  J  differences  in 

orders    of   any   one   remarkable   man,   but   by  the  <he  producu 

•'       .  .  .  .  J    of  different 

spontaneous  action  of  certam  natural  causes.  It  locaiiues, 
must  first  be  observed  that  its  general  character 
and  its  progress  are  always  found  to  depend  on 
the  same  thing.  They  depend  on  the  division  of 
labour.  This,  as  Mr.  Spencer  says,  developed 
in  varying  degrees,  is  the  salient  characteristic  of 
every  civilisation  in  the  world.  To  what,  then,  is 
the  division  of  labour,  in  the  first  instance,  itself 
due  ?     This  is  the  opening  question  asked  by  Adam 


32  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I      Smith  in  his  Wealth  of  Nations ;  and  he  seems  to 

Chapters  ,  ,     ^    , 

regard  it  as  one  which  is  more  or  less  mysterious 
and  recondite.  The  answer  which  he  himself 
suggests  is,  that  there  exists  in  man  "  a  natural  pro- 
pensity to  truck,  barter,  and  exchanger  The  answer 
given  by  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer  is  a  curious  illustra- 
tion of  how  far,  since  the  days  of  Adam  Smith, 
social  science  has  progressed. 

Mr.  Spencer  shows  us  that  the  origin  of  the 
division  of  labour  was  no  special  propensity 
mysteriously  innate  in  man.  Its  origin  was  the 
natural  diversity  of  the  various  districts  inhabited  by 
the  groups  of  men  who  originally  took  part  in  it. 

Thus  '■'■some  of  the  Fiji  Islands,''  he  writes,  '"'' are 
famous  for  wooden  implements,  others  for  mats  and 
baskets,  others  for  pots  and  pigments  —  unlikenesses 
between  the  natural  products  of  the  islands  being 
the  causes.  .  .  .  So  also  .  .  .  the  shoes  of  the  ancient 
Peruvians  were  made  in  the  provinces  where  aloes 
are  most  abu7idant,  for  they  were  made  of  the  leaves 
of  an  aloe  called  '■maguey'  The  arms  were  supplied 
which  led  to     by  the  provinces  where   the  materials  for  m-aking 

the  localisation    ,,  ,.  7r)>■r^•••  fii 

of  industries,  them  wcre  most  abundant.  Division  ot  labour,  in 
short,  was  primarily  a  localisation  of  industries, 
caused  by  the  fact  that  a  number  of  man's  different 
needs  were  each  supplied  most  easily  by  industry 
in  some  different  locality. 

By  means  of  this  explanation  of  the  origin  of  the 
division  of  labour,  Mr.  Spencer  proceeds  to  explain, 
in  a  way  which  would  have  astonished  Adam  Smith 
still  more,  other  social  phenomena  of  a  kind  which 


HUMAN  NATURE  AND  SOCIAL  PROGRESS    33 
seem  wholly  different.     He  proceeds  to  show  us  that      ^°°''  ^ 

,     .  ,  ,  .  •    .  Chapter  z 

though  increased  production  of  commodities  was  the 

chief  direct  result  of  the  localisation  of  industries,  The  locaiisa- 

.  tion  of  indus- 

certain    by-products    resulted   from    it   also,   whose  tnes  in  its  turn 
effects  were  not  less  important.     These  by-products  maki^ng"^ 
were  roads.     In  the    localisation    of   industries,  he 
says,  we  have  the  true  origin  of  road-making.     The 
fact  of  industries  being  widely  separated  in  place, 
required  a  constant  interchange  of  the  various  sorts 
of  goods ;  and  the  carriage  of  these  goods  to  and  fro 
between  the  same  points  first  produced  tracks,  such 
as  those  made  by  animals,  then  paths,  and  at  last 
regular  roads.     But  to  facilitate  the  movement  and 
interchange  of  goods  is  not  the  only,  or  the  highest, 
though  it  may  be  the  first,  function  of  roads.     Roads 
facilitate   two    things    of    a    yet    more    interesting  and  roads 
character  —  the  movement  of  ideas  and  the  central-  the  central- 
isation of  authority.     They  form,  in  fact,  the  great  authority  and 
physical  basis  of  civilised  human  government,  and  jj*^''*^^^"^^  °^ 
of  the  development  of  the  human  intellect. 

These   examples   of    Mr.    Spencer's    conclusions  Next,  as  to 
will  be  sufficient  to  show  how  he  studies  the  pheno-  ^h^xlc^x"!^^^ 
mena  of  social  progress  in  so  far  as  they  are  the  other^cau^e^of 
result  of  what   he   calls  ''the  external  factors''  —  progress, 
climate,  locality,  and  the  character  of  the  other  races 
with  which  each  race  that  is  studied  happens  to  have 
been  brought  in  contact.     Let  us  now  turn  to  what 
he  calls  the  "  internal  factors'''  and  consider  the  phe- 
nomena of  progress  which  he  explains  by  reference  to 
these.     He  helps  us  here  by  providing  us  with  a 
summary  of  his  own,  in  which  he  calls  the  attention 

3 


34  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I      of  his  readers  to  the  most  important  of  his  own  con- 

Chapter  2  ,  .  ,  ^ 

elusions  arrived  at  m  precedmg  chapters  as  to  this 
section  of  his  subject.  Having  reminded  us  of  how 
he  started  with  the  ''  external  factors^'  and  how  he 
had  shown  the  ways  —  namely  those  we  have  just 
glanced  at  —  in  which  they  co-operated  to  produce 
civilisation,  "  our  attentio7i"  he  proceeds,  "  was  the7i 
directed  to  the  internal  factors  "  ;  and  what  he  had 
to  tell  us,  he  says,  about  the  internal  factors  was  as 
their  primitive  foUows .'  "  An  account  was  first  p^iven  of  '  Primitive 

character  did  _  . 

not  fit  them  to  Man  — physical^  showing  that  by  stature^  structurCy 
strength  ,  .  .  he  was  ill  fitted  for  overcomhig  the 
diffictilties  in  the  way  of  advance.  Then  examina- 
tion of  'The  Primitive  Man  —  emotiojiaT  led  us  to 
see  that  his  imprudence  and  his  explosiveness,  re- 
strained but  little  by  sociality  a7id  the  altruistic 
sentiments,  rendered  him  unfit  for  co-operation. 
And  then,  in  the  chapter  on  ''Primitive  Ma7i — i^i- 
tellectualy  we  saw  that  while  adapted  by  its  active  and 
acute  perceptions  to  the  needs  of  a  wild  life,  his  type 
of  mind  was  deficient  in  the  faculties  required  for 
progress  i7i  knowledge^  Then,  having  referred  to 
the  long  explanation  given  by  him  of  the  rise  of 
man's  religious  belief,  Mr.  Spencer  goes  on  to  say 
that  these  primitive  human  characteristics  constitute 
the  internal  factors,  with  which  sociology  starts,  and 

till  it  was        that  the  business  of  this  science  is  to  explain  the 

gradually  im-  .  r  1 1  1  1 

proved  by  the  cvolution    01    all     thosc    subscqucut    '"'phenomena 

marwageand  rcsultiug  from  their  combi^ied  actio^is^     Of  these 

Is^e^ku^^  phenomena  the  chief,  he  says,  are  the  following  — 

monogamy,  monogamy  as  evolved   from  polygamy,  polyandry, 


EVOLUTION  OF  MARRIAGE  35 

and  promiscuity ;  the  higher  family  affections  as  ^'^'^  ^ 
developed  by  the  monogamous  family ;  and  govern- 
mental and  social  organisation  as  developed  in  two 
ways  —  by  the  conduct  essential  to  war  and  the 
conduct  essential  to  industry.  His  conclusions,  so 
far  as  possible,  shall  be  given  in  his  own  words. 

To  besfin  with  marriage :  in  the  earlier  stages  of  Monogamy 

"        ^  ...  represents  the 

society  nothing  resembling  it  existed.  The  nearest  survival  of  the 
approach  to  a  family  was  the  mother  and  such  social  union. 
children  as  could  be  kept  alive  without  the  help  of 
the  father;  and  as  the  children  grew  up,  this 
rudimentary  group  dissolved.  But  "■'from  families 
thus  small  and  incoherent''^  there  naturally  and 
inevitably  arose,  in  accordance  with  the  tendency  to 
variation  by  which  the  human  units  are  characterised, 
and  which  is  the  basis  of  all  evolutionary  selection, 
""families  of  divergent  types''''  —  families  founded  on 
unions  of  which  some  were  more  lasting  than 
others,  of  which  some  were  unions  between  one 
mother  and  many  fathers,  some  between  one  father 
and  many  mothers,  and  some  between  one  father  and 
one  mother.     This  last-named  type  of  union,  and  ^*  developed 

•'  ^  .  tne  affections 

the  family  life  resulting  from  it,  had  many  practical  and  the  prac- 
advantages,  such  as  the  production  of  closer  bonds  co-operation. 
between  the  several  members  of  the  family,  and 
consequently  the  practice  between  them  of  more 
efficient  co-operation.  Accordingly,  no  sooner  did 
monogamous  groups  appear  than  they  exhibited 
a  tendency  to  survive  in  the  social  struggle  for 
existence ;  and  monogamy  affords,  with  the  affec- 
tions that  have  grown  up  under  its  shelter,  the  type 


36  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

of   marriage  and  family  that  p 
most  advanced  races  of  to-day. 

aSy  rosffrom  formation  of   groups    larger  than   the   family  —  of 


Book  I  of   marriage  and  family  that  prevails  amongst  the 

Chapter  2  ^  J  f  O 

The  family  Ncxt,  as  to  the  phenomena  of  governmental  and 

being  estab-  .         .  .   "  •   i         i 

Hshed,  the  social    Organisations :    these    arise    only   with    the 


It 


groups  which  we  call  communities,  or  nations,  or 
social  aggregates ;  and  we  have  to  consider  how 
these  larger  groups  rose  out  of  the  aggregation  of  the 
smaller.  The  process  is  explained,  says  Mr.  Spencer, 
by  the  same  few  "  internal  factors^  The  nation 
sprang  from  the  family  by  the  following  inevitable 
stages.  Let  us  take  any  family  group,  sufficiently 
coherent  to  live  together  as  a  single  household,  and 
supporting  itself  on  the  produce  of  the  land  that 
surrounds  its  dwelling.  Whilst  this  group  is  small, 
the  acreage  will  be  small  also,  which,  as  ploughland, 
hunting-ground,  or  pasture,  is  required  to  supply  its 
wants ;  and  each  member  of  the  group  can  easily 
reach  his  work,  starting  from  the  common  home, 
and  coming  back  to  it  in  the  evening.  But  as 
children  grow,  and  children  and  great-grandchildren 
One  family      multiply,  the  land  required  by  the  household  corre- 

increased,  and  ti  •  -i 

gave  rise  to      spoudingly  grows  in  extent,  and  at  last  becomes  so 

wS  w^re "'  large  that  the  whole  of  it  cannot  be  utilised  by  a 

ord?r^?og"et     t)ody  of  mcn  living  on  the  same  spot.     Hence,  as 

food,  to  separ-  ^x.  Spcnccr  cxprcsscs  it,  "  a  fission  of  the  group 

ent groups;      is  necessitated'" ;   and  this  process   is  repeated   till 

there  are  a   multitude   of   groups   instead   of   one. 

These  groups,  says  Mr.  Spencer,  constitute  the  raw 

material   of    the   nation.      The    nation   is  formed 

"  by  the  recompouitding  of  these  units  once  again!' 


WAR  AND  THE  E VOL UTION  OF  GO  VERNMENT     3 7 

And    how    is    this    process    of    ''' recompotmdznjr^^      Booki 
accompHshed  ?      Mr.    Spencer    answers    it    is    ac-        ^'p^'^^ 
complished  by  one  means  only,  and  that  is  the  co- and  the  recom- 
operation  forced  on  them  by  war  for  some  common  E"  groups. 
interest.      Other   tribes   threaten    to    attack    their  S^f^J^r'' 
territory,  or  they  are  desirous  of  appropriating  the  aggression. 
territory    of    other    tribes.      Separately    they    aref^ation. 
powerless.     The  only  course  open   to  them   is  to 
band  themselves  together  and  submit   themselves 
to  a  common  leader.     In  cases  where  such  wars  are 
short,  as  observation  of  savage  tribes  shows  us,  the 
rudimentary  nation  with  its  rudimentary  discipline 
dissolves  and  disappears  as  soon  as  the  wars   are 
over ;  but  when  the  state  of  warfare  is  prolonged  by  »"  government 

1  .1  fi  ••  1  .••.  lit-       being  in  its 

the  rivalry  01  other  societies,  the  military  leadership  origin  military. 
develops   into  a  permanent   centralised    authority; 
and  from  this  military  government,  with  its  ""coercive 
mstitutions^^   national    existence  and   all  forms  of 
government  spring. 

And  here  Mr.  Spencer's  argument  takes  a  new  But  as  the  ans 

1  1  1  •  ill  •     .         1  of  life  progress, 

departure  and  carries  us  on  to  the  point  where  we  industry gradu- 
shall   be  compelled  to  leave  it.     As  governments  pjfJ'JJj",?'" 
and  civilisations  have  advanced,  he  says,  they  have  ^'^°"'  govem- 

^  -'  ^  -'_   ^  mental  control, 

taken  two  forms — that  in  which  the  original  military  and  becomes 

,  .,,  .  ,  1      1  •       its  own  master. 

element  still  continues  to  preponderate,  and  that  in  and  aiso  forms 
which    the    military    element    becomes    gradually  po*iitica'i^d^e- 
subordinate  to  the  industrial.     "  The  for'fner^'  he  "ocracy. 
says,   "  in  its  developed  form  is   organised  on    the 
principle   of   compulsory   organisation^    whilst  tfie 
latter   in    its   developed  form    is   organised  on   the 
principle  of  voluntary  co-operation  " ;  and  the  latter 


38  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I  amongst  civilised  nations,  always  tends  to  supersede 
the  former,  in  precise  proportion  as  war  tends  to 
become  less  common.  The  industrial  form,  it  may 
be  observed,  corresponds  in  a  general  way  to  the 
kinds  of  government  commonly  called  "democratic  "; 
but  its  emergence,  says  Mr.  Spencer,  has  its  most 
important  effects  in  the  sphere  not  of  politics,  but  of 
economic  production.  Originally  the  conditions  of 
industry  were  regulated  by  the  dictates  of  the  military 
and  aristocratic  ruler,  as  they  are  to-day  in  some  savage 
communities,  and  as  they  partially  were  in  France 
till  towards  the  close  of  the  last  century.  Under 
such  a  regime  the  very  **  right  to  labour "  itself  is 
regarded  as  belonging  to  the  King ;  and  he  sells  it 
to  his  subjects  on  such  terms  as  he  may  choose. 
But  as  the  military  element  in  the  government 
declines,  not  only  does  the  character  of  governmental 
legislation  change,  but  industry  frees  itself  from 
governmental  influence  altogether.  No  king  any 
longer  arranges  markets,  fixes  wages  or  prices,  and 
settles  what  kind  and  quantities  of  commodities  shall 
be  produced.  Industry  becomes,  as  Mr.  Spencer 
says,  "  substantially  independent^  He  does  not 
mean,  however,  that  it  needs  no  regulation.  It  needs 
as  much  as  ever  a  constant  and  nice  adjustment 
of  the  things  produced  to  the  current  require- 
ments of  the  community;  but  this  adjustment  is 
now  secured  not  by  the  interference  of  a  political 
ruler,  but  by  a  system  which  has  spontaneously 
developed  itself  amongst  the  trading  and  manu- 
facturing classes.     It  is  a  system,  says  Mr.  Spencer, 


THE  EMANCIPATION  OF  INDUSTRY  39 

which  we  may  call  "  internunciaL  throiirk  which  the      '^^^'^  ^ 

^  ,.  -  .      *     -  Chapter  2 

various  structtires  (i.e.  manufacturing  firms^  etc.) 
received  from  one  a^iother  stimuli  or  checks^  caused 
by  rises  and  falls  iii  the  consumptiojt  of  their  respec- 
tive products.  .  .  .  Markets  in  the  chief  towns  show 
dealers  the  varying  relations  of  supply  aiid  demand; 
a7id  the  reports  of  these  transactions^  diffused  by  the 
press^  prom,pt  each  locality  to  increase  or  decrease  of 
its  special  functions.  .  .  .  That  is  to  say,  there  has 
arisen,  in  addition  to  the  political  regulating  system, 
an  industrial  regulating  system,  which  carries  on  its 
co-ordinating  function  independently  —  a  separate 
plexus  of  connected  gajtgliar 

We  have  now  looked  at  social  evolution,  as  the  ^ow,  if  we 

consider  all 

product  of  both  those  sets  of  causes  —  the  ''  external  these  con- 
factors'^  and  the  "  internal'''' — by  which  Mr. Spencer  Mr.  spencer's 
explains  it,  and  have  followed  it,  under  both  aspects, 
from  the  earliest  beginnings  of  progress  to  the 
dawn  and  development  of  civilisation,  such  as  history 
knows  it.  Our  account  of  Mr.  Spencer's  theory  of 
the  ascent  of  man  and  society  is  necessarily  very 
incomplete  ;  but  the  various  conclusions  mentioned  we  shaii  find 

,  .  .  .  them  all  to  be 

m   it   may    be   said    to   be   exhaustively  typical  of  conclusions 
the  conclusions   of  social  science  as    Mr.  Spencer  gaJ'es'a?^'^^' 
conceives  of  it.  wholes,  not 

about  parts 

And  now  let  us  consider  what  the  nature  of  those  of  aggregates, 
conclusions  is.  We  shall  find  that  they  are,  one  and 
all  of  them,  conclusions  with  regard  to  aggregates. 
All  the  phenomena  with  which  they  deal  are 
phenomena  not  of  individuals,  not  of  different  classes, 
but  of  masses  of  men,  communities,  races,  nations. 


40  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  1      the  units  of  which  are  resrarded  as  beino:  virtually  so 

Chapters         ,      .  .  o  .  .     ^  ^ 

similar,  that  what  is  true  of  one  is  virtually  true  of 
all.  This  similarity  certainly  is  not  imputed  to  all 
mankind.  Men  are  recognised  as  having  been 
different  in  one  epoch  from  what  they  become  in 
another,  and  one  race  and  the  inhabitants  of  one 
climate  as  being  different  from  other  men  differently 
born  and  circumstanced.  The  primitive  millions 
who  could  hardly  walk  upright,  and  whose  sexual 
The  only        rclatious    rcscmbled    those    of    the    animals,    are 

differences  ,...,,.  ,      ,  , 

recognised  by  distmguishcd  from  their  erect  successors  who 
men  are^  married  and  lived  in  families ;  and  the  strong  and 
be^eenTne  cncrgetic  raccs  are  distinguished  from  their  weaker 
homogeneous  contemporarics.      But  each  of  these  aorgjreeates  is 

aggregate  and  '■  ...  oa      a 

another.  regarded  as  a  unit  in  itself.  The  conquering  race 
which  has  grown  vigorous  in  dry  regions,  and  the 
inferior  race  enslaved  by  it,  which  has  lost  its 
strength  in  moist  regions,  are  contrasted  sharply 
with  each  other ;  but  neither  is  made  the  subject  of 
any  internal  division,  nor  treated  as  though  the 
units  composing  it  were  not  virtually  similar.  Mr. 
Spencer  of  course  admits  (for  this  is  one  of  the 
fundamental  parts  of  his  philosophy)  that  these 
wholes,  these  aggregates,  progress  through  a 
constant  differentiation  of  their  parts,  different 
functions  being  performed  by  an  increasing  number 
of  groups  ;  but  the  units  who  compose  these  groups, 
and  whom  he  calls  the  " internal  factors','  are 
regarded  by  him  as  being  congenitally  each  a 
counterpart  of  the  others ;  and  their  different 
functions  and  their  different  acquired  aptitudes  are 


MR.  SPENCER  AND  THE  SOCIAL  AGGREGATE  41 
resrarded  as  the  result  of  different  external  circum-      ^0°^ ' 

,  .  .  Chapter  2 

stances  which  press  into  different  moulds  one  and 
the  same  material.  Thus  when  the  single  group 
from  which  the  nation  originally  springs  undergoes, 
as  it  becomes  more  numerous,  what  Mr.  Spencer 
calls  the  process  of  "  fission,"  and  spreads  itself  in 
search  of  food  over  an  ever-extending  area,  new 
groups  separate  not  because  they  have  different 
appetites,  but  because,  having  the  same  appetites, 
they  must  satisfy  them  in  different  places  by  the 
exercise  of  the  same  faculties.  Division  of  labour, 
as  we  have  seen,  he  explains  in  the  same  way ;  and 
not  its  origin  only,  but  its  latest  and  most  elaborate 
developments.     Of  the  manufacturinfy  businesses  of  ^"'^  ^'^'^''^^^^^ 

•*•  .  ...  between  simi- 

to-day,  for  instance,  with  their  promoters,  managers,  lar  men  who 
capitalists,  and  multitudes  of  various  workmen,  not  occupred° 
only  is  each  business   treated  by  him  as  a  single  ^'^'^^^""y- 
unit,  but  each  of  these  units,  or  ganglia,  is  a  unit 
which  differs  from  the  rest  for  accidental   reasons 
only,  as  a  gardener  who   happens    to    be    digging 
may  differ   from  a   gardener  who   happens    to   be 
raking  a  walk ;   and  he  describes  the  whole  as  "  as  . 
plexus   of  ganglia    C07inected    by   an    internuncial 
system." 

The  use  of  this  last  phrase,  and  the  physiological 
analogy  suggested  by  it,  illustrate  yet  more  clearly 
the  fact  here  insisted  on — namely,  that  for  Mr. 
Spencer  the  sociologist's  true  unit  of  interest  is  the 
social  aggregate,  as  a  whole,  to  the  exclusion  of  the 
individual  or  of  the  class.  The  latter  are  merely 
the  ganglia,  or  veins,  or  nerves,  which  are  nothing 


42 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  I 
Chapter  2 


But,  as  has 
been  said 
already,  the 
social  prob- 
lems of  to- 
day arise  out 
of  a  conflict 
between 
different  parts 
of  the  same 
aggregate ; 
therefore  the 
phenomena  of 
the  aggregates 
as  a  whole  do 
not  help  us. 


except  as  connected  with  the  organism  to  which 
they  belong.  Each  social  aggregate,  in  fact,  is  a 
single  animal ;  and  whatever  is  achieved  or  suffered 
by  any  class  or  individual  within  it,  is  really  achieved 
or  suffered,  in  the  eye  of  the  Spencerian  sociologist, 
not  by  the  class  or  the  individual,  but  by  that  cor- 
porate animal,  the  community. 

Now  a  study  of  these  phenomena  of  aggregates 
is,  as  has  been  said  already,  valuable  for  speculative 
purposes.  It  has  led  those  who  have  pursued  it 
to  a  variety  of  important  conclusions  which  have 
largely  revolutionised  our  conception  of  human 
history,  and  of  the  conditions  that  engender  civil- 
isations or  else  preclude  their  possibility.  It  has 
shown  us  human  life  as  a  great  unfolding  drama, 
but  it  has  hardly  given  us  any  help  at  all  in  dealing 
with  the  practical  problems  that  belong  to  our  own 
day ;  and  the  reason  of  this,  which  has  already  been 
stated  generally,  must  be  apparent  the  moment  we 
consider  what  these  practical  problems  are.  Their 
general  character  is  sufficiently  indicated  by  such 
familiar  antitheses  as  aristocracy  and  democracy,  the 
few  and  the  many,  rich  and  poor,  capital  and  labour, 
or,  as  Mr.  Kidd  puts  it,  collectivists  and  the 
opponents  of  collectivism.  In  other  words,  the 
social  problems  of  to-day  —  like  the  social  problems 
of  most  other  periods  —  are  problems  which  arise 
out  of  the  differences  between  class  and  class. 
That  is  to  say,  they  depend  on,  and  derive  their 
sole  meaning  from  phenomena  which  are  not  refer- 
able to  the  social  aggregate  as  a  whole,  but  which 


AGGREGATE  AND  ITS   CONFLICTING  PARTS     43 

are  manifested  severally  by  distinct  and  independent      ^°°'*  ^ 

-'      -'  ^  Chapters 

parts.  The  social  aggregate,  when  regarded  from 
this  standpoint,  is  no  longer  a  single  animal,  whose 
pains  or  pleasures  reveal  themselves  in  a  single 
consciousness.  It  is  a  litter  of  animals,  each  of 
which  has  a  consciousness  of  its  own,  and,  together 
with  its  consciousness,  interests  of  its  own  also, 
which  are  opposed  to  those  of  the  others,  instead 
of  coinciding  with  them. 

And  now  let  us  consider  more  closely  out  of  what  The  conflict- 

■^  between  the 

this  opposition  arises.  Mr.  Spencer,  as  we  have  parts  of  the 
seen,  in  our  rapid  survey  of  his  arguments,  lays  great  arises  from  in- 
stress  on  the  fact  that  as  men  rise  into  aggregates,  posulon?  °* 
they  do  so  only  on  condition  of  submitting  them- 
selves to  governors,  military  in  the  first  place,  and 
at  a  later  stage  civil.  The  truth,  however,  which 
he  thus  elaborates,  whatever  may  be  its  speculative 
importance,  fails  to  have  any  bearing  on  any  practical 
problem,  because  it  is  not  a  truth  about  which  there 
has  ever  been  any  practical  disagreement.  Aristo- 
crat, democrat,  and  socialist  all  agree  that  there 
must  be  orderly  government  of  some  sort,  and  official 
governors  to  administer  to  it.  The  point  at  issue 
between  them  is  not  whether  some  must  govern 
and  others  submit  to  be  governed,  but  how  the 
individuals  who  perform  the  work  of  government 
shall  be  chosen,  and  what,  apart  from  their  official 
superiority  and  authority,  shall  be  their  position  with 
regard  to  the  rest  of  the  community.  Why  should 
they  enjoy  any  special  social  advantage  ?  Or  if 
they  are  to  enjoy  it,  why  should   they  be  usually 


44  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  1      drawn  from  a  small  privileged  class,  and  not  from  the 

Chapters  ^  .  .     ,  .  ,  , 

masses  of  the  community,  smkmg  to  the  general 
level  again  when  their  tenure  of  office  terminates  ? 
Such  are  the  questions  proposed  by  one  party; 
whilst  the  other  party  replies  by  contending  that  the 
of  which  Mr.  limited  class  in  question  can  alone  supply  governors 
sociology  takes  of  the  required  talents  and  character.  Of  this  clash 
no  account.  ^^  opinions  and  interests,  which  is  as  old  as  civil- 
isation itself,  though  in  each  age  it  assumes  some 
different  form,  Mr.  Spencer's  social  science  neces- 
sarily takes  no  cognisance,  because  the  parts  of  each 
social  aggregate  have  for  him  no  separate  existence. 
The  same  criticism  applies  to  his  treatment  of 
economic  production.  He  explains,  as  we  have 
seen,  the  origin  of  the  division  of  labour,  showing 
how  **  uiilikeness  between  the  products  of  different 
districts "  inevitably  led  to  "  the  localisation  of 
industries,''  turning  one  set  of  savages  —  to  use  his 
own  example  —  into  potters,  another  into  makers  of 
baskets.  But  here  again  we  have  a  truth  which, 
whatever  its  speculative  interest,  has  no  bearing  on 
any  practical  problem;  for  no  one  denies  that 
division  of  labour  is  necessary,  nor  do  any  of  the 
difficulties  of  to-day  turn  upon  its  remote  origin. 
Socialists  and  individualists  are  alike  ready  to  admit 
that  different  men  must  follow  different  industries. 
The  point  at  issue  is  why,  within  the  limits  of  the 
same  industry,  different  men  pursue  it  on  different 
levels,  some  being  masters  and  capitalists,  some 
being  labourers  and  subordinates.  Here,  just  as 
in  the  sphere  of  political  and  military  government, 


THE  SOCIAL  PROBLEMS   OF  TO-DAY         45 
we  have  one  class  defendinsf  its  existins:  position      ^^^^ ' 

•    -1  ^  if  1  .  Chapters 

and  privileges,  and  another  class  attacking  or  ques- 
tioning them ;  and  it  is  out  of  circumstances  such 
as  these,  thus  briefly  indicated,  that  the  practical 
social  problems  of  the  present  day  arise. 

Now  the  question  at  the  bottom  of  these  can  be  sodai  prob- 

•  1  Tr       11  lems  arise  out 

reduced  to  very  simple  terms.     It  all  members  of  of  the  desire  of 
the  community  were   content  with  existing  social  po°s?rionra?e 
arranorements,  it  is  needless  to  say  there  would  be  l"^"'""^  *°  .^^^^ 

o  '  -'  their  positions 

no  social  problems  at  all.     Such  problems  are  due  changed; 
entirely  to    the  existence  of  persons  who  are   not 
contented,  and  who   desire    that   certain    of   these 
arrangements  should  be  changed.     It  will  be  seen, 
accordingly,  that  the  great  and  fundamental  question 
which,  as  a  practical  guide,  the  sociologist  is  asked 
to  answer,  is  whether  or  how  far  the  changes  desired  and  the  practu 
by  the  discontented  are  practicable ;  and   the  first  is  the  change  ' 
step  towards  ascertaining  how  far  the  arrangements  po^s^ibL^?^ 
in  question   can   be  turned  into  something  which 
they   are    not,  is    to    ascertain    precisely  how  they 
have  come  to  be  what  they  are. 

But  this  way  of  putting  the  case  is  still  not 
sufHciently  definite.  Mr.  Spencer  himself  has  put 
it  in  somewhat  similar  language;  and  yet  in  doing 
so  he  has  missed  the  heart  of  the  problem.  Mr. 
Spencer's  speculative  gaze,  travelling  over  the 
past  and  present,  sees  one  generation  melting  like 
a  cloud  into  another,  and  takes  no  note  of  the  indi- 
viduals that  compose  each.  The  practical  sociologist 
must  adopt  a  very  different  method  of  observation. 
He  must  remember  that   practical  problems  arise 


46 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  I 
Chapter  2 


To  answer  this 
question  we 
must  examine 
into  the  causes 
why  such  and 
such  indi- 
viduals are  in 
inferior,  and 
others  in 
superior  posi- 
tions. 


and  become  practical,  not  in  virtue  of  their  relation 
to  mankind  generally,  but  in  virtue  of  their  relation 
to  each  particular  generation  that  is  confronted  by 
them ;  and  a  particular  generation  in  any  given 
community,  and  the  different  classes  into  which  the 
community  is  divided,  are  made  up  respectively  of 
particular  men  and  women.  In  asking,  therefore, 
how  the  social  arrangements  we  have  been  consider- 
ing have  come  to  be  what  they  are,  we  must  not  ask 
in  vague  and  general  terms  why  a  portion  of  the 
social  aggregate  occupies  a  position  which  contents 
it,  and  another  portion  a  position  which  exasper- 
ates it;  but  we  must  consider  the  individuals  of 
which  each  portion,  at  any  given  time,  is  composed, 
and  begin  the  inquiry  at  the  point  at  which  they 
begin  it  themselves.  "  Why  am  I  —  Tom  or  Dick 
or  Harry  —  included  in  that  portion  of  the  aggregate 
which  occupies  an  inferior  position?  And  why  are 
these  men  —  William  or  James  or  George  —  more 
fortunate  than  I,  and  included  in  the  portion  of 
the  aggregate  which  occupies  a  superior  position?" 
To  this  question  there  are  but  three  possible 
answers.  The  inferior  position  of  Tom  or  Dick 
or  Harry  is  due  to  his  differing  from  William  or 
James  or  George  in  external  circumstances,  which 
theoretically,  at  all  events,  might  all  be  equalised 
—  such,  for  example,  as  his  education;  or  it  is  due 
to  his  differing  from  them  in  certain  congenital 
faculties,  with  respect  to  which  men  can  never 
be  made  equal  —  as,  for  example,  in  his  brain  power 
or  his  physical  energy ;  or  it  is  due  to  his  differing 


ORIGIN  OF  SOCIAL  INEQUALITIES  47 

from  them  in  external  circumstances  which  have  ^°°'' ' 
arisen  naturally  from  differences  in  the  congenital 
faculties  of  others,  and  which,  if  they  could  be 
equalised  at  all,  could  never  be  equalised  with 
anything  like  completeness  —  such,  for  example,  as 
the  possession  by  William  and  James  and  George 
of  leisured  and  intellectual  homes  secured  for  them 
by  gifted  fathers,  and  the  want  of  such  homes  and 
fathers  on  the  part  of  Tom  and  Dick  and  Harry. 

The  first  question,  accordingly,  which  we  have  to  Are  mequaii- 
ask  is  as  follows.     Taking  Tom  or  Dick  or  Harry  due  to  alterable 
as  a  type  of  those  classes  who  happen  to  occupy  an  ^"*^  ^'^^'' 


dental  circum- 
stances ? 


inferior  position  in  the  aggregate,  and  comparing 
him  with  others  who  happen  to  occupy  superior 
positions,  we  have  to  ask  how  far  he  is  condemned 
to  the  inferior  position  which  he  resents  by  such 
external  circumstances  as  conceivably  could  be 
equalised  by  legislation,  and  how  far  by  some 
congenital  inferiority  of  his  own,  or  circumstances 
naturally  arising  out  of  the  congenital  inferiority 
of  others.  Or  we  may  put  the  question  conversely, 
and  ask  how  William  and  George  and  James  have 
come  to  occupy  the  positions  which  Tom,  Dick, 
and  Harry  envy.  Do  they  owe  their  positions 
solely  to  unjust  and  arbitrary  legislation,  which  a 
genuinely  democratic  parliament  could  and  would  or  are  they 

,      ^       \-^  ..  --.  -  due  to  con- 

undo  ?     Or  to  exceptional  abilities  of  their  own,  ot  genital  in- 

which  no  parliament  could  deprive  them.-*     Or  toSichli^om 

advantages   secured   for   them   by  the   exceptional  ^"  *''^"if° 

abilities  of  their  fathers,  which  no  parliament  could 

interfere  with,  or,  at  all  events,  could  abolish,  without 


48  ARISTOCRACY  AND   EVOLUTION 

Book  I      entering:  on  a  conflict  with  the  instincts  of  human 

Chapter  2  *-'  .  .  . 

nature,  and  interfering  with  the  springs  of  all  human 
action  ? 
Social  ine-  Now  that  cxtemal  circumstances  of  a  kind,  easily 

qualities  are  ,  ■' 

partly  due  to    alterable    by  legislation,  have  been,  and  often  are, 

oircumstances ;  •^  ^        r  -i*  i*.*  •  t      1 

responsible  for  many  social  inequalities,  is  a  tact 
which  we  may  here  assume  without  particularly  dis- 
cussing it.  The  inquiry,  therefore,  narrows  itself 
still  further,  and  resolves  itself  into  this :  Do  the 
congenital  superiorities  or  inferiorities  of  the  per- 
sons, or  of  parents  of  the  persons,  who  at  any  given 
time  are  occupying  in  the  social  aggregate  superior 
and  inferior  positions,  play  any  part  in  the  produc- 
tion of  these  social  inequalities  at  all  ? 

This  question  must  plainly  be  the  practical 
sociologist's  starting-point ;  for  if  social  inequalities 
are  due  wholly  to  alterable  and  artificial  circum- 
stances, social  conditions  are  capable,  theoretically, 
at  all  events,  of  being  equalised ;  but  if,  on  the 
other  hand,  inferior  and  superior  positions  are  partly, 
at  all  events,  the  result  of  the  congenital  inequalities 
of  individuals,  over  which  no  legislation  can  exercise 
the  least  control,  then  a  natural  limit  is  set  to  the 
possibilities  of  the  levelling  process ;  and  it  is  the 
business  of  the  sociologist,  if  he  aspires  to  be  a 
but  most         practical   guide,  to   beQ:in  with    ascertaining  what 

people  will  ^  ,.       .  A  1  1  •       1       • 

admit  that  con- these  limits  arc.  Are,  then,  the  congenital  in- 
equalities in  equalities  of  men  a  factor  in  the  production  of  social 
muTh'  toTo      inequalities,  or  are  they  not  ?  ^ 

with  them.  Now  to  many  people  it  will  seem  that  even  to 

ask  this  question  is  superfluous.     They  will  regard 


INEQUALITIES  IN   CAPACITY  49 

it  as  a  matter  patent  to  common  sense  that  men's      ^°°'*  ^ 

.  .  Chapter  2 

congenital    mequalities    are  to  a   large   extent   the 
cause,  in  every  society,  of  such  social  inequalities  why  then 

...     insist  on  this 

as  exist  in  it;  and  they  will  possibly  say  that  it  is  fact? 
a  mere  waste  of  time  to  discuss  a  truth  which  is  so  Because  this 
self-evident.     It  happens,  however,  that   the   more  ciseiy  what  our 
obvious  it  seems  to  be  to  common  sense,  the  more  sodoiogStr^ 
necessary  it  is  for  us  to  begin  our  present  inquiry  '^"ore. 
with  insisting  on  it ;  and  the  reason  is  that,  in  spite 
of  its  being  so  obvious,  the  whole  school  of  contem- 
porary sociologists,  with  Mr.  Spencer  as  their  head, 
base  their  whole  method  of  sociological  study  on  a 
denial  of  it.     By  their  method  of  dealing  with  social 
aggregates  only,  they  deny  not  only  the  influence, 
but  even  the  existence    of   congenital   inequalities, 
and  endeavour  to  explain  them  away  as  an  illusion 
of  the  unscientific  mind.     They  admit,  indeed,  as 
our  quotation  from  Mr.  Spencer  showed,  that  the 
primitive  man  was  congenitally  different  from  man  in 
later  ages.     They  admit  that  the  individuals  reared 
in  a  dry  climate,  who  formed  the  conquering  aggre- 
gates, were  congenitally  different  from  the  individuals ' 
reared  in  a  moist  climate,  who  formed  the  enslaved 
aggregates ;  but  they  absolutely  refuse  to  take  any 
account  whatever  of  the  congenital  inequalities  by 
which  individuals  within  the   same    aggregate   are 
differentiated. 

In  order  to  show  the  reader  that  such  is  literally 

the  case,  we  need  not  rely  merely  on  such  inferences 

as  have  just  been  drawn  from  the  manner  in  which 

Mr.   Spencer   applies   his    method,    and   from    the 

4 


50  ARISTOCRACY  AND   EVOLUTION 

Book  I      oreneral  character  of  his  conclusions.     We  have  the 

Chapter  2      *-•,  ^ 

direct  evidence  of  his  own  categorical  statements. 

Let  us    turn   again    to    the   criticism   with   which, 

as  Mr.  Spencer  as   wc   havc   alrcadv  seen,  he    prefaces   his   whole 

shows  us  by  ^  ^  ^    •'  ■•■ 

his  distinct  scrics  of  sociological  writings,  and  which  may  be 
assertions,  as  taken  as  his  fundamental  profession  of  faith  —  his 
chtl^ter^of ^  cHticism,  namely,  of  what  he  calls  "  the  great-man 
his  conciu-  t/ieory"  his  rejection  of  it  as  being  a  theory  which 
would  render  all  social  science  impossible,  and  his 
enunciation  of  the  theory  which  he  contends  must 
take  its  place.  It  may  seem  to  some  readers  that 
his  rejection  of  the  great  man  as  a  vera  causa  which 
will  explain  social  phenomena  amounts  to  no  more 
than  a  rejection  of  that  exaggerated  view  of  history 
which  expresses  itself  in  the  works  of  writers  such 
as  Froude  and  Carlyle,  and  which  vaguely  attributes 
all  the  progressive  changes  of  humanity  to  the  per- 
sonality of  rulers,  of  political  and  military  autocrats 
—  such  as  Henry  VIII.,  Cromwell,  and  Frederick 
the  Great  of  Prussia.  And  indeed,  to  judge  by  Mr. 
Spencer's  language,  it  is  this  exaggerated  view 
which  has  been  most  frequently  present  in  his 
mind,  as  we  may  see  by  referring  to  the  passage 
already  quoted,  which  concludes  his  demonstration 
that  the  ''great-man  theory""  is  false.  With  the 
sole  exception,  he  says,  of  the  military  struggles  of 
primitive  tribes,  "  new  activities,  7iew  institutions, 
new  ideas,  unobtrusively  make  their  appearance, 
without  the  aid  of  any  king  or  legislator ;  and  if 
yoti  wish  to  understand  the  phenomena  of  social 
evolution,  yoti  will  not  do  it  should  you  read  yourself 


MR.  SPENCER'S  FALSE  ASSUMPTION  51 

blind  over  the  biographies  of  all  the  great  rulers      Book  i 
on    record,    down    to    Frederick    the    Greedy    and 
Napoleon  the  Treacherous T 

But  Mr.  Spencer,  in  rejecting  the  great  '' ruler^^^llf^^^'" 
and  legislator "  as  a  factor  in  social  evolution  un-  great-man 

.  ,      ,  .    ,        .  .  theory  is  a 

worthy  of  the  attention  of  the  sociologist,  is  really  removal  of  aii 
rejecting  a  great  deal  else  besides.  He  is  really  eqSies  from 
rejecting  every  inequality  in  capacity  by  which  a  ^j'^^y^.''^  °^ 
certain  number  of  men  are  differentiated  from,  and 
raised  above  others.  In  order  to  show  that  such  is 
the  case,  we  will  avail  ourselves  of  his  own  words.. 
We  will,  then,  start  with  one  casual  remark  out  of 
many,  in  which  Mr.  Spencer,  forgetting  his  own 
theories,  slips  into  a  method  of  observation  truer  than 
the  one  he  advocates.  "  Men,''  he  writes  in  his  Study 
of  Sociology,  "  who  have  aptitudes  for  accumulating 
observations  are  rarely  men  given  to  generalising ; 
whilst  men  given  to  generalising  are  co^nmonly 
men  who,  mostly  usijtg  the  observation  of  others, 
observe  for  themselves  less  from  love  of  particular 
facts  than  from  the  desire  to  ptit  such  facts  to  use''' 
Nothing  can  be  clearer  than  the  distinction  here 
drawn.  It  is  one  of  great  importance  in  the 
elucidation  of  many  social  problems ;  and  it  deals  not 
with  the  likeness,  but  with  a  congenital  difference, 
which  exists  between  men  belonging  to  the  same 
social  aggregate.  But  now  let  us  compare  this 
with  another  passage,  in  which  Mr.  Spencer,  re- 
turning again  to  his  theory,  explains  how  members 
of  the  same  aggregate  are  to  be  treated  by  any 
sociologist  who  would  claim  to  be  a  man  of  science. 


5*  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I      '^  Amonzst  societies   of  all  orders   and  sizes,''   he 

Chapter  2  .  «=>  -^  .  r     j    ^        -^       ,t 

writes,  "  sociology  has  to  ascertain  what  traits  there 
are  i^i  common,  determined  by  the  common  traits  of 
human  beings  ;  what  less  general  traits,  distinguish- 
ing certain  groups  of  societies,  result  from  traits 
distinguishing  certain  races  of  men;  and  what 
peculiarities  in  each  society  are  traceable  to  the 
peculiarities  of  its  members^  This  is  clumsily  ex- 
pressed ;  but  its  meaning,  which  is  quite  obvious, 
may  be  seen  by  taking,  as  a  typical  society,  that  of 
England.  The  sociologist,  in  explaining  English 
society,  will  have  to  consider,  according  to  Mr. 
Spencer,  first,  what  traits  Englishmen  have  in 
virtue  of  being  human  creatures ;  secondly,  he  will 
have  to  consider  what  traits  they  have  in  virtue  of 
being  Europeans,  not  Orientals ;  and,  thirdly,  he  will 
have  to  consider  what  traits  they  have  in  virtue  of 
being  Englishmen,  not  Frenchmen  or  Germans. 

The  reader  will  at   once   perceive    the   contrast 

between  the  spirit  of  these  two  passages.      In  the 

former  Mr.  Spencer  notes,  with  great  penetration 

and  accuracy,  a  most  important  point  of  difference 

and  he  actually  between  two  scts  of   mcu   belonging   to  the  same 

defines  an  ,  tii  iii'i  •• 

aggregate  as  socicty.  In  thc  latter  he  deals  with  societies  as 
pos"edo°f™'  single  bodies,  the  members  of  which  possess  no 
approximately  pgrsonal  traits  whatever,  except   such    as    they  all 

equal  units.         t^  '  ^  J 

possess  alike ;  and  all  the  traits  in  which  they  differ 
from  one  another,  such  as  the  one  just  alluded  to, 
of  necessity  disappear  from  the  field  of  vision 
altogether.  Should  any  doubt  as  to  the  matter  still 
remain  in  the  reader's  mind,  it  will  be  dispelled  by 


THE  HYPOTHESIS   OF  EQUAL    UNITS  53 

the   quotation    of  one  further   passage.     "  A    true      ^°°'' ' 
social  aggregate^'  he  says  ["^i-  distinct  front  a  viere 
large  fainily\  is   a  Mnio7i  of  like   individuals^  in- 
depe7ident  of  07ie  another  in  parentage,  and  approxi- 
mately equal  in  capacities^ 

Here  is  the  case  stated  with  the  most  absolute 
clearness.  All  congenital  inequalities,  as  was  said 
just  now,  between  the  various  individuals  who 
make  up  the  aggregate  are  ignored ;  and  it  is 
upon  this  hypothesis  of  approximately  equal  units, 
acted  on  by  different  external  circumstances,  that  he 
attempts  to  build  up  his  whole  system  of  sociology. 
He  is,  indeed,  little  as  he  himself  may  suspect  it, 
reproducing  in  another  form  the  error  of  Karl 
Marx  and  the  earlier  of  the  so-called  "scientific 
socialists,"  who  maintained  that  all  wealth  was  the 
product  of  common  or  average  labour,  measured 
by  time,  and  that  hour  for  hour  any  one  labourer 
necessarily  produced  as  much  wealth  as  another. 
The  socialists  of  to-day  are  already  beginning  to  see 
that  this  monstrous,  though  inareniously  advocated,  His  failure. 

1  •         .  ,1  1        f  1       •  c  .and  that  of 

doctrme  is  untenable  as  the  foundation  01  economics ;  others,  as 
and  yet,  strange  to  say,  a  doctrine  strictly  equivalent  Todoiogists 
to    it    forms    the    accepted    foundation    of     con- JJJr  buuding 
temporary  social  science.     That  science  starts  with  °"  '^'^  ^aise 

,  .  .  ,  ,  .  hypothesis. 

the  hypothesis  of  approximately  equal  units,  and 
ignores  the  congenital  differences  between  the 
individuals  who  compose  the  aggregate.  We  shall 
find  it  to  be  ultimately  from  differences  of  this  kind 
that  all  the  practical  problems  which  beset  civilisa- 
tion spring,  and  that  the  inability  of  the  modern 


54  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I      sociologists,    complained    of    by    Mr.    Kidd     and 

Chapter  2  o         '  ir  j 

Professor  Marshall,  to  throw  on  these  problems  any 
definite  light  is  simply  the  natural  and  inevitable 
result  of  excluding  the  differences  in  question 
altogether  from  their  scientific  purview. 

We  will,  in  the  next  chapter,  consider  the  whole 
range  of  arguments  used  by  Mr.  Spencer  and  others 
in  justification  of  this  error. 


CHAPTER  III 

GREAT  MEN,  AS  THE  TRUE  CAUSE  OF  PROGRESS 

It  is  evident   that  an  error  of  the   kind   now  in  The  ignominy 

,  1  1  r      1       of  natural 

question  does  not  represent  the  carelessness  of  the  inequalities  is 
untrained  thinker.     It  is  nothing  if  not  dehberate ;  procedure!* 
and  indeed  Mr.  Spencer  admits  that  it  is  altogether  J-^^^^j^^^j^^^®* 
in  opposition  to  the  opinions  which  men  naturally 
hold.     Accordingly,  the  arguments  by  which  he  and 
his  followers  justify  it,  and  have  actually  imposed  it 
on  all  the  sociological  thinkers  of  their  generation, 
require,  before  we  reject  them,  to  be  examined  with  Let  us  examine 

.  Mr.  Spencer's 

the  utmost  care.  defence  of  it. 

Let  us  then  turn  our  attention  once  again  to  the 
grounds  on  which  Mr.  Spencer  refuses  to  admit 
the  great  or  exceptional  man  as  a  true  factor  in  the 
production  of  social  change.  If  the  reader  will 
reflect  upon  the  account  that  has  been  already  given 
of  Mr,  Spencer's  arguments  in  connection  with  this  He  defends  it 
point,  he  will  find  that  Mr.  Spencer  rejects  the  °'^^y^' 
great   man  for   two    reasons,   which   are    not   only  (i)  by  saying 

,.      .  ,  ,  .  Ill  that  the  great 

distmct,    but    are,    when    interpreted    closely,    not  man  does  not 
entirely  consistent  with  each  other.     One  of  these  he\Jems  to  ** 
reasons  is  that  the  great  or  exceptional  man  does^°' 

55 


56  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I      not  really  produce  those  ffreat  chancres  of  which  he 

Chapters       .  •;      ,  .  P  .     .    .  „         ,  , 

IS  nevertheless  "•  the  proximate  t^ntiator    ;  the  other 
(2)  by  saying   fg  that,  outsidc  the  sphcrc  of  primitive  warfare,  he 

that  what  he  ..... 

seems  to  do  docs  not  cvcn  proximately  initiate  any  great  changes 
muS"^  ^  at  all.  The  first  of  these  two  contentions  is  ex- 
pressed with  sufficient  clearness  in  his  statement 
"  if  there  is  to  be  a7iy thing  like  a  real  explanation  " 
of  those  changes  of  which  the  great  man  is  the 
'"'proximate  initiator' — changes,  to  quote  an  example 
which  he  himself  gives,  such  as  those  produced  by 
the  conquests  of  Julius  Caesar  —  this  explanation 
must  be  sought  not  in  the  great  man  himself,  but 
"  in  the  aggregate  of  social  conditions  out  of  which 
he  and  they  (i.e.  the  chaitges  commonly  supposed  to 
have  bee7i  produced  by  him)  have  arisen!''  Mr. 
Spencer's  second  contention  is  expressed  in  the 
following  passage,  the  concluding  words  of  which 
have  been  quoted  already,  but  on  which  it  will  be 
presently  necessary  for  us  to  insist  again.  "'Rec- 
ognising''' he  says,  "  what  truth  there  is  in  the 
great-man  theory^  we  may  say  that^  if  lim^ited  to  the 
history  of  primitive  societies.,  the  histories  of  which 
are  histories  of  little  else  than  endeavours  to  destroy 
one  another.,  it  approximately  expresses  fact  in  rep- 
rese7iting  the  great  leader  as  all-important.  But 
its  imineyise  error  lies  in  the  assumption  that  what 
was  once  true  was  true  for  ever.,  and  that  a  relation 
of  ruler  and  ruled  which  was  good  at  one  time  is 
good  for  all  time,  fust  as  fast  as  the  predatory 
activity  of  early  tribes  diminishes.,  just  as  fast  as 
large   aggregates   are  formed.,  so  fast  do   societies 


MR.  SPENCER    ON  THE  MILITARY  LEADER    57 

begin  to  give  origi7t  to  7iew  activities^  new  ideas,  all      ^°^^  ^ 
of  which  unobtrusively  make  their  appearance  with- 
out the  aid  of  any  ki7tg  or  legislator^ 

It   will    be    necessary   to    deal   with    these    two  He  admits  that 

-  .  .  •   1        1       the  great  man 

contentions  separately ;  and  we  will  begin  with  the  does  do  some- 
second,  as  set  forth  in  the  words  just  quoted.     We  lioHfiln'^^^ 
shall  find  it  valuable  as  an  example  of  that  singular  *^'^' 
confusion  of    thought  by  which  all  the  reasoning 
of   our   sociologists  with    regard    to   this   question 
is  vitiated.     Mr.  Spencer   speaks  of   an   "-immense 
error""  which   he  is  pointing  out  and   correcting. 
The  ''''immense  error''  in  reality  is  to  be  found  in 
his  own  conception.     It  is  hard  to  imagine  anything 
more  arbitrary  and  more  gratuitously  false  than  the 
contrast  which  he  here  draws  between  the  actions  but  denies  that 
of  men  in  primitive  war,  for  the  success  of  which  thing  excep- 
he  admits  a  great  leader  to  have  been  essential,  and  sphere  of  ^^ 
their  various    actions  and  activities  as  manifested  p^^^^^^"'  pi'oe- 

ress. 

in  peaceful  progress,  which,  he  contends,  neither 
require  leadership  nor  exhibit  traces  of  its  influence. 
We  are  at  this  moment  altogether  waiving  the 
question  of  how  far  the  great  leader,  when  he  is 
the  proximate  cause  of  the  military  successes  of  his 
tribe,  is  their  cause  in  any  deeper  sense.  It  is 
enough  for  us  now  to  take  Mr.  Spencer's  admission 
that  the  leader  is  really  the  cause,  in  some  sense  or 
other,  of  the  social  changes  connected  with  early 
warfare ;  and,  keeping  to  this  sense,  let  us  consider 
in  what  possible  way  less  causality  can  be  attributed 
to  the  actions  of  great  men  and  leaders  in  the 
sphere  of  peaceful  progress. 


58 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  I  «« ^  primitive  society',''  if  it  is  to  become  powerful 

in  war  —  this  Mr.  Spencer  admits  —  must  have  a 

But  how  does  great  leader  to  direct  it.     But  what  precisely  is  it 

the  great  man    ,  ,-.  ^1^c-11^ 

fulfil  his  that  such  a  leader  is  and  does :  buch  a  leader 
wrr?°By°  leads,  because  he  is  one  mind  or  personality  impress- 
othere"°  ^^S  ^^^  ^^^  moment  its  superior  qualities  on  many 
minds  or  personalities.  He  supplies  the  fighting 
men  of  his  society  with  an  intelligence  not  their  own 
—  often  with  a  courage,  a  presence  of  mind,  and  a 
resolution.  He  dictates  to  them  the  directions  in 
which  their  feet  are  to  carry  them ;  the  manner  in 
which  they  are  to  group  themselves ;  the  movements 
of  their  hands  and  arms.  He  gives  the  word,  and 
a  thousand  men  dig  trenches.  He  gives  the  word 
again,  and  a  thousand  men  wield  swords ;  now  he 
makes  them  advance ;  now  he  makes  them  halt ; 
and  the  measure  of  his  greatness  as  a  leader  is  to  be 
found  in  those  results  which,  by  directing  the  action 
of  all  these  men,  he  elicits  from  it. 

And  now  from  the  triumphs  of  war  let  us  turn 
to  those  of  peace.  "  These',''  says  Mr.  Spencer, 
"  unlike  the  former,  m^ake  their  appearance  unobtru- 
sively, without  the  aid  of  any  king  or  legislator'' 
It  may,  no  doubt,  be  true  that  they  do  appear 
unobtrusively  in  the  sense  that  they  are  not  accom- 
panied by  trumpets  and  drums  and  tom-toms.  A 
factory  for  the  production  of  toffee,  or  of  trimmings 
for  ladies'  petticoats,  does  not  require  an  Ivan  the 
Terrible  to  direct  it,  nor  are  Mr.  Spencer's  sentences 
as  he  writes  them  punctuated  by  discharges  of 
artillery.     But  if  the  essence  of  kingship  and  leader- 


MR.  SPENCER  AS  AN  INDUSTRIAL  DICTATOR    59 

ship  is  to  command  the  actions  of  others,  the  larger      ^°o''  ^ 

f      ,  .  .    .   .  ,  ,      ,  Chapters 

part  of  the  progressive  activities  of  peace,  and  the 

arts  and  products  of  civilisation,  result  from  and  im- The  great  man. 

1         1        •     n  r  1   •  111  •  •    11      '"  peace,  does 

ply  the  influence  or  kings  and  leaders,  in  essentially  precisely  the 
the  same  sense  as  do  the  successes  of  primitive  war,  ^^^^  ^  '"^' 
the  only  difference  being  that  the  kings  are  here 
more  numerous,  and  though  they  do  not  wear  any 
arms  or  uniforms,  are  incomparably  more  autocratic 
than  the  kings  and  Czars  who  do. 

As  a  particularly  clear  illustration  of  this  im- 
portant truth,  let  us  take  Mr.  Spencer  himself,  and 
place  him  before  his  own  eyes  as  an  autocratic  king 
or  ruler.  In  certain  respects  he  is  so;  and  it  is 
only  because  he  is  so  that  he  has  been  able  to  give, 
through  his  books,  his  thoughts  and  theories  to  the 
world.     For  let  us  examine  any  one  of  his  volumes  Mr.  spencer. 

.  .,  ,  ...  -  .,.--  -  for  example, 

and  consider  what  it  is,  in  so  far  as  it  dmers  from  orders  the 
any  other  volume — let  us  say  from  a  treatise  on  the  ^h™  p°ut  his 

cutting:  of  trousers,  or  an  attack  on  the  Spencerian  ^°°^^  '"^° 
.       .        .         ...  ^yp^' 

philosophy  —  which  is    printed  in  similar  type  on 

pages  of   the  same  size.     It  differs  solely  in  the 

order  in  which  the  letters  have  been  arranged  by 

the  hands  of  the  compositors;  and  its  value  as  a 

work  of  philosophy  consequently  depends  altogether 

on  a  certain  complicated  series  of  movements  which 

the  hands  of  the  compositors  have  made.    And  how 

has  this  prolonged  series  of  minute  movements  been 

secured  ?     It  has  been  secured  by  the  fact  that  Mr. 

Herbert  Spencer,  through  his  manuscript,  has  given 

the  compositors  a  prolonged  series  of  orders,  which 

their  hands,  day  after  day,  have  been  obliged  to  obey 


6o  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I      passively.     He  has  been  as  absolute  a  master  of  all 

Chapter  3  .  "^  , 

their  professional  actions  as  ever  was  the  most 
arbitrary  general  of  the  professional  actions  of  his 
soldiery;  and  there  is  absolutely  no  difference  in 
point  of  command  and  obedience  between  the  com- 
positors who,  at  Mr.  Spencer's  bidding,  put  into 
type  the  words  "  homogeneity "  and  "  the  Unknow- 
able,''  and  the  Guards  who  charged  the  French  at 
the  bidding  of  the  Duke  of  Wellington. 
The  inventor        Precisclv  the  samc  thing  is  true  of  all  scientific 

orders  the  men  _  ,  "'  .  '-' ,  . 

by  whom  his    invcutious  —  not  iudccd  of  inventions  as  mere  ideas 

inventions  are  ii-  •  i,f'  i*  it 

manufactured,  and  discovcrics,  but  ot  mvcutious  and  discoveries 
applied  practically  to  the  service  of  civilisation. 
The  mere  discovery  of  certain  properties  belong- 
ing to  material  substances,  or  the  thinking  out 
of  some  new  machine  or  process,  may  be  the 
work  of  one  man,  who  has  command  over  nobody 
except  himself.  But  the  moment  he  proceeds  to 
make  his  machine  or  process  useful  —  to  apply  it 
to  the  purpose  of  actual  business  or  manufacture  — 
he  is  obliged  to  secure  for  himself  an  entire  army 
of  mercenaries,  who  act  under  his  orders  in  precisely 
the  same  way  as  soldiers  act  under  the  orders  of  the 
military  leader,  or  as  the  compositors  act  under  the 
orders  of  Mr.  Spencer.  When  the  electric  telegraph 
was  supplemented  by  the  invention  of  the  telephone, 
telephones  were  produced,  and  could  have  been  pro- 
duced, only  by  a  multitude  of  men  performing  a 
series  of  manual  actions  which  were  different  in 
detail  from  anything  they  had  performed  before,  and 
which,  if  it  had  not  been  for  the  inventor,  would  never 


THE  AUTOCRACY  OF  THE  INVENTOR        6i 
have  been  performed  at  all.     They  filed  or  thev      '^°°'* ' 

,  ,     .  ,  -11  Chapter  3 

cast  pieces  of  metal  mto  new  shapes ;  with  these 
pieces  of  metal  they  connected  in  new  order  pieces 
of  other  materials,  such  as  wood  and  vulcanite,  the 
shape  of  these  last  being  new  and  special  also ;  and 
every  piece  of  material  shaped  or  connected  with 
another  piece  was  the  exact  resultant  of  so  many 
manual  movements  made  in  passive  obedience  to  the 
inventor's  autocratic  orders.  It  was  only  because  his 
orders  were  obeyed  with  such  humble  fidelity  and 
completeness  that  these  movements  resulted  in 
telephones,  enriching  the  world  with  a  new  con- 
venience, and  not  in  the  old-fashioned  telegraphic 
machines,  or  in  penholders,  or  vulcanite  inkstands, 
or  even  in  useless  heaps  of  shavings  and  brass 
filings.  And  the  same  is  the  case  with  every  inven- 
tion or  contrivance  which  has  helped  to  build  up  the 
fabric  of  modern  material  civilisation. 

Civilisation,  however,  even  in  its  most  material 
sense,  does  not  consist  of  contrivances  and  inventions 
only.  "  The  one  operation^^  says  Mill,  '^  of  putting 
things  into  fit  places  .  ,  .  is  all  that  man  does,  or 
can  do,  with  matter.  He  has  no  other  means  of 
acting  on  it  than  by  moving  it^  But  valuable  as  this 
formula  is,  it  is  not  sufficiently  comprehensive ;  for 
there  is  another  economic  process  which,  to  the  The  great  man 
ordinary  mind  at  all  events,  is  hardly  suggested  by  ordeTs  wf 
such  a  phrase  as  "  to  move  matter r  employees. 

The  process  referred  to  consists  in  the  moving  of 
men.  What  is  meant  by  the  distinction  here  drawn 
is  this  —  that  the  industrial  efficiency  of  a  community 


62  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I      (jQgg  not  depend  solely  on  the  muscles  of  the  manual 

Chapter  3  ..... 

workers  being  given  a  right  direction,  so  that  they 
shall  shape  material  objects  in  such  and  such  a 
way,  but  it  depends  also  on  the  movements  which 
are  prescribed  to  the  men  being  prescribed  to  the 
men  best  fitted  to  perform  them,  and  being  pre- 
scribed to  them  in  such  order  that  when  each  move- 
ment has  to  be  made,  the  men  told  off  to  make  it 
shall  be  ready  to  make  it  at  the  moment.  Here 
we  see  part  of  the  secret  of  the  success  of  the  great 
contractor. 
The  hotel-  The  importance  of  these  considerations  becomes 

keeper  orders 

his  staff.  all  the  clearer  to  us  when  we  reflect  on  the  fact 
that  the  mere  production  of  commodities,  and  the 
production  of  the  means  of  production,  form  but  a 
part  of  the  processes  which  advance,  maintain,  and 
indeed  constitute  civilisation.  A  part  almost  equally 
large  consists  in  the  rendering  of  various  personal 
services,  which  often,  no  doubt,  involve  the  utilisa- 
tion of  improved  appliances,  but  which  almost  as 
often  are  neither  more  nor  less  than  the  performance 
of  actions  of  a  simple  and  ordinary  kind,  the  merit 
and  demerit,  the  wastefulness  or  the  economy,  of 
which  depend  on  their  being  performed  with  absolute 
punctuality  and  despatch.  A  good  example  of  this 
is  the  case  of  a  large  hotel.  Whether  a  large  hotel 
is  carried  on  at  a  profit  or  at  a  loss  depends  almost 
entirely  on  this  question  of  personal  management. 
The  success  of  a  successful  manager  does  not  depend 
on  his  capacity  for  inventing  new  methods  of  waiting, 
of  cooking,  or  of  making  beds.     It  depends  on  his 


THE  ''PROXIMATE  INITIATOR''  63 

capacity  for  organising  his  staff  of  cooks,  waiters,  ^^^^^ ' 
and  chamber-maids.  This  is  well  expressed  by  that 
most  significant  American  saying,  "  He's  a  smart 
man,  but  he  couldn't  keep  a  hotel " ;  the  meaning 
being  that  one  of  the  most  important,  and  at  the 
same  time  one  of  the  rarest,  faculties  required  for 
maintaining  a  complicated  civilisation  like  our  own 
is  the  faculty  by  which,  given  a  number  of  tasks,  one 
man  governs  a  number  of  men  in  the  act  of  co- 
operatively performing  them. 

Examples  of  this  kind  might  be  indefinitely  mul- ah  these  men 
tiplied,  but  those  just  adduced  are  quite  sufficient  great  military 
to  prove  the  sole  point  insisted  on  at  the  present  and  if  ?he  Ster 
moment  —  namely,  that  whatever  be  the  part  (and  If  ^^"T^L^ 
Mr.  Spencer  admits  it  to  be  "  all-important " )  which  ^^^  f°'''"e''- 
the  great  man  plays  as  a  leader  in  primitive  warfare, 
a  part  precisely  similar  in  kind  is  played  by  other 
great  men  in  the  peaceful  processes,  and,  above  all, 
in  the  progress  of  civilisation. 

And  now,  having  dealt  with  this  point,  let  us  turn  Next,  as  to  the 
to  Mr.  Spencer's  other  contention  —  his  contention  Ihrgr"!? man 
namely  that,  whatever  the  part  may  be,  and  however  ^^^^^l^^ 
seemingly  important,  which  the  great  man  plays  in  ^^'y-  ^"^  "°^ 
producing  social  changes,  he  is,  in  any  case,  nothing  cause- 
but  their  ''''proximate  initiator  "  ;  —  that  "  they  have 
their  chief  cause  hi  the  generations  he  descended 
from^' ;  —  and  that  if  there  is  to  be  anything  like 
a  real  and  scientific  explanation  of  them,  it  must 
be   sought  in  the  aggregate  of   conditions  out   of 
which   both  he  and  they  have  arisen,   and  not  in 
the  great  man's  personality  as  revealed  to  us  by  any 


64  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I      records  of  his  life,  or  by  any  analysis  of  his  peculiar 
faculties. 

We  have  already  seen  in  a  general  way  how  this 
feat  of  merging  the  great  man  in  "  ike  aggregate  of 
this,  as  Mr.      cofiditions  out  of  wJiick  he  has  arisen  "  is  performed 
three  popular   by  Mr.  Spcnccr  himself.     Let  us  now  turn  for  a 
dayYhowLt.    momcut  to  three  other  writers  who,  though  differ- 
ing from  him  as  to  certain  of  his  conclusions,  have 
with  regard  to  this  particular  point  done  little  else 
than  popularise  and  apply  his  teaching. 

"//  needs  only  a  little  reflection','  writes  Mr. 
Kidd,  "  to  enable  us  to  perceive  that  the  marvellous 
accomplishments  of  modern  civilisation  are  primarily 
the  measure  of  the  social  stability  a7id  social  efficiency^ 
and  not  of  the  iittellectual pre-emi7tence  of  the  peoples 
who  have  produced  them.  .  .  .  J^or  it  must  be  re- 
membered  that  even  the  ablest  men  amo7igst  us,  whose 
names  go  down  to  history  connected  with  great  dis- 
coveries and  inventions,  have  each  in  reality  advanced 
the  sum  of  knowledge  by  only  a  small  addition.  In 
the  fulness  of  time,  and  when  the  ground  has  been 
slowly  and  laboriously  prepared  for  it,  the  great  idea 
fructifies  and  the  discovery  is  made.  It  is,  in  fact, 
the  work  not  of  one  but  of  a  great  num,ber  of  persons. 
How  true  it  is  that  all  the  great  ideas  have  beefi  the 
products  of  the  time  rather  than  of  iftdividuals  may 
be  the  more  readily  realised  when  it  is  remem,bered 
ihaty  as  regards  a  large  number  of  them,  there  have 
been  rival  claims  put  forward  for  the  ho7iour  of 
authorship  by  persons  who,  working  quite  independ- 
ently, have  arrived  at  like  results  ab7iost  simultaite- 


THE   CASE  AGAINST  THE    GREA7  MAN      6$ 
ously.     Thus  rival  and  iridepejident  claims  have  been      '^°'^^  ^ 

.  .  .  Chapter  3 

made  for  Ihe  discovery  of  the  differential  calculus^  .  .  . 
the  invention  of  the  steam  engine^  .  .  .  the  methods 
of  spectrum  analysis,  the  telegraph,  the  telephone, 
as  well  as  fnany  other  discoveries.^^  And  then 
Mr.  Kidd  proceeds  to  quote  with  approval  the 
following  sentence  from  an  essay  which  was  written 
by  an  American  socialist,  Mr.  Bellamy;  and  the 
sentence  has  been  repeated  with  solemn  and 
triumphant  unction  in  half  the  socialistic  books 
which  have  been  given  to  the  world  since. 
"  Nine  hundred  and  ninety-nine  parts  out  of  the 
thousand  of  every  mans  produce  are  the  result  of 
his  social  inheritance  and  environment^  "  This 
is  so,^'  remarks  Mr.  Kidd,  "  and  it  is,  if  possible, 
even  vtore  true  of  the  work  of  our  brain  than  of  the 
work  of  our  handsT  To  these  passages  we  must 
add  one  from  Mr.  Sidney  Webb,  who  is,  intellectu- 
ally, a  favourable  example  of  a  modern  English 
socialist.  Referring  to  the  socialistic  proposal  that 
all  kinds  of  workers,  no  matter  what  their  work, 
should  be  paid  an  equal  wage,  "  this  equality',''  he 
says,  "  has  an  abstract  j'ustif  cation,  as  the  special 
ability  or  energy  with  which  some  persons  are  born 
is  an  unearned  increment  due  to  the  effect  of  the 
struggle  for  existence  upon  their  ancestors,  and 
consequently,  having  been  produced  by  society,  is  as 
much  due  to  society  as  the  unearned  increment  of 
rentr 

Here  we  have  then,  in  the  words  of  these  four  resolves  itself 
writers,  Mr.  Spencer,  Mr.  Kidd,  Mr.   Bellamy,  and  arguments : 


66  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I      ;\Ij-.  Sidney  Webb,  the  case  asrainst  the  s^reat  man 

Chapters  •'  °  y 

set  fully  before  us ;  and  we  may  accordmgly  proceed 
to  analyse  it.  We  shall  find  that  it  divides  itself 
into  four  separate  arguments,  which  are  constantly 
recurring  in  some  form  or  other  in  all  the  works  of 
our  modern  sociological  writers,  and  especially  in  the 
works  of  those  who  are  democratic  or  socialistic  in 

(1)  That  every  their  Sympathies.     Firstly,  there  is   the  argument 

first  discovcrv 

involves  all  that  in  any  advanced  civilisation  not  one  of  the 
bSoreTt^  ^°"^  improvements  made  during  any  given  epoch  would 
have  been  possible  if  a  variety  of  other  improve- 
ments and  the  accumulation  of  various  knowledge 
had  not  gone  before  it ;  and  that  thus  the  man  who 
is  called  the  inventor  or  author  of  the  improvement 
is  merely  the  vehicle  or  delegate  of  forces  outside 

(2)  that  the     himself.     Secondly,  there  is  the  argument  that  the 

discoverer's         .  ,  ,,  r    ji         •  1  t 

ability  itself  is  mvcutor  or  author  oi  the  improvement,  even  it  we 

p^alt^cTrcuS-"^  attribute  to  him  some  special  ability  of  his  own,  is 

stances;         j^  rcspcct  of   his  own  congcnital   energies  merely 

the  product  and  expression  of  preceding  generations 

and   circumstances.      Of    the    four   arguments    in 

question,  these  are  the  most  important;   but  they 

(3)  that  often   are  constautly  reinforced    by  two  others.     One  is 

the  same  dis-  1  r  1  1*11 

covery  is  made  drawn    irom    thc    fact    that    several    independent 

by  several  men  1  c,  •  •  1,  1  j.     j.i 

at  once;         workcrs  oitcn  arrive    simultaneously  at   the    same 

(4)  that  the      discovery.     The    other   is   drawn  from   the  fact  — 
difference  what  is  alleo^cd  to  be  the  fact  —  that  the  interval 

between  the  o 

great  and  the    which    dlvidcs    cvcn    thc    grcatcst   man   from    his 

ordinary  man  ,.,  .  r  i  1  • 

is  slight.  fellows,  alike  in  respect  of  what  he  is  and  of 
what  he  accomplishes,  is  really  extremely  slight, 
and  not  worth  considering. 


SIMULTANEOVS  DISCOVERY  67 

For  convenience'  sake,  we  will  deal  with    these      b°°''^ 

1  r  1  1  r      1  Chapter  3 

two  latter  arguments  nrst,  and  put  them  out  of  the 
way  before  we  approach  the  others.     We  will  begin  simultaneous 
with  the  argument  drawn  from  the  fact  that  the  same  showrti7at°"'^ 
discovery    is    often    made    simultaneously    by    in- f^J"^^ '^f''";^ 
dependent  workers.     This  would  perhaps  hardlv  be  ^^^  greater 

,,.  .  .f    .  1  *^^"  others. 

worth  discussmg  if  it  were  not  used  so  constantly 
by  such  a  variety  of  serious  writers.  The  fact  is 
true  enough,  but  what  is  the  utmost  that  it  proves  t 
If  two  or  three  men  make  the  same  discovery  at 
once,  this  does  not  prove,  as  it  is  supposed  to  do, 
that  all  men  are  approximately  equal,  but  that  two 
or  three  men,  instead  of  one  man,  are  greater  than 
the  rest  of  their  fellow- workers.  If  three  horses  at 
a  race  out-distance  all  competitors,  and  pass  the 
winning-post  within  the  same  three  seconds,  this 
does  not  prove  that  a  cart-horse  is  as  swift  as  the 
Derby  favourite.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  that  more 
men  than  one  should  reach  at  the  same  time  the 
same  discovery  independently  is  precisely  what  we 
should  be  led  to  expect,  when  we  consider  what 
discovery  is.  The  facts  of  nature  which  form  the 
subject-matter  of  the  discoverer  are  in  themselves 
as  independent  of  the  men  who  discover  them  as 
an  Alpine  peak  is  of  the  men  who  attempt  to  scale 
it.  They  are  indeed  precisely  analogous  to  a  peak 
which  all  discoverers  are  attempting  to  scale  at 
once ;  and  the  fact  that  three  men  make  the  same 
discovery  simultaneously  does  no  more  to  show 
that  any  of  their  neighbours  could  have  made  it, 
and  that  it  is  made  in  reality,  not  by  them,  but  by 


68  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I      their  generation,  than  the  fact  that  the  three  most 

Chapters       ... 

intrepid  cragsmen  in  Europe  meet  at  last  on  the 
same  virgin  summit,  which  other  adventurers  had 
sought  to  scale  in  vain,  would  prove  the  feat  to  have 
been  really  accomplished  by  the  mass  of  tourists  at 
Interlaken,  who  had  never  climbed  anywhere  except 
by  the  Rigi  railway,  and  whose  stomachs  would  be 
turned  by  a  precipice  of  twenty  feet. 
The  extent  of       Lg^  ^g  ^^^  tuvvi  to  thc  argument  that  the  in- 

the  great  man  s  o 

superiority  cqualitics  bctwccn  men's  abilities  are  small,  that  the 
how  it  is  work  accomplished  by  even  the  ablest  is  small  also, 
measure  .       ^^^  ^|^^^  ^^^  exceptional  man  as  a  separate  subject 

of  study  may,  in  the  words  of  a  writer  who  will 
be  quoted  presently,  be  in  consequence  ''safely 
7ieglectedy  The  answer  to  this  is  that  whether  an 
inequality  be  great  or  small  depends  altogether  on 
the  point  from  which  the  total  altitude  is  measured. 
If  a  child  who  is  three  feet  high,  and  a  giant  who  is 
nine  feet  high,  are  both  of  them  standing  on  the 
summit  of  Mont  Blanc,  the  difference  between  the 
elevation  of  their  respective  heads  above  the  sea- 
level  will  be  infinitesimal ;  but  no  one  who  was 
discussing  the  question  of  human  stature  would  say 
that  little  children  and  giants  were  of  approximately 
the  same  height.  Similarly,  if  our  object  is  to 
compare  men  in  general  with  all  other  living 
creatures,  no  doubt  the  difference  between  the 
ordinary  man  and  a  microbe  is  incomparably  greater 
than  the  difference  between  an  ordinary  man  and 
Newton ;  but  if  our  object  is  to  compare  men  with 
men,  in  relation  to  this  or  that  mental  capacity  —  let 


THE  EXTENT  OF  NATURAL  INEQUALITIES     69 

US  say  the  capacity  for  scientific  and  mathematical  ^°'^'^ ' 
discovery  —  the  difference  which  separates  one 
ordinary  man  from  another  is  insignificant  when 
compared  with  the  difference  by  which  Newton  is 
separated  from  both  of  them.  And  it  is  this  latter 
sort  of  difference  which  alone  concerns  the  soci- 
ologist. The  difference  which  separates  men  from 
microbes  is  nothing  to  him.  And  what  is  true  of 
what  men  are,  is  equally  true  of  what  they  do.  The 
addition  made  by  any  one  great  man  to  knowledge 
may  be  small  when  compared  with  the  knowledge, 
res^arded  in  its  totality,  which  has  been   gathered  i*  "^'^y  ^^ 

1  1  11         1  1.  1    .  1  slight  to  the 

together  by  all  other  great  men  preceding  him ;  but  speculative 
it  may  at  the  same  time  be  incalculably  great  when  tut  t'o^the*^'^' 
compared  with  the  additions  made  by  the  ordinary  ftTaJf'  ""*" 
men,  his  contemporaries.  important. 

Let  us  make  this  matter  yet  clearer  by  reference 
to  one  more  authority,  who,  though  endeavouring 
to  confirm  the  very  argument  which  is  here  being 
exposed,  is,  little  as  he  perceives  it,  assassinated  by 
his  own  illustrations.  In  Macaulay's  essay  on 
Dryden  there  occurs  the  following  passage,  a  part 
of  which  anticipates  the  exact  phraseology  of 
Mr.  Spencer.  "//  is  the  age  that  makes  the  man, 
not  the  man  that  makes  the  age.  .  .  .  The  ittequali- 
ties  of  the  intellect,  like  the  inequalities  of  the 
surface  of  the  globe,  bear  so  small  a  proportio7i  to 
the  mass,  that  in  calculating  its  great  revolutions 
they  may  safely  be  neglected^  The  passage  is 
quoted  for  the  sake  of  this  last  simile.  For  those 
who  study  the   human   destiny  as  a  whole  —  who 


70  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I  survey  it  as  speculative  and  remote  observers  —  the 
inequalities  of  intellect  may,  it  is  quite  true,  be 
neglected  as  safely  as  the  inequalities  of  the  surface 
of  a  planet  are  neglected  by  the  astronomer  who  is 
engaged  in  calculating  its  revolutions.  But  because 
these  latter  inequalities  are  nothing  to  the  astrono- 
mer, it  does  not  follow  that  they  are  nothing  to  the 
engineer  and  the  geographer.  To  the  astronomer 
the  Alps  may  be  an  infinitesimal  and  negligible 
excrescence,  but  they  were  not  this  to  Hannibal  or 
the  makers  of  the  Mont  Cenis  tunnel.  What  to 
the  astronomer  are  all  the  dykes  in  Holland }  But 
they  are  all  the  difference  to  the  Dutch  between  a 
dead  nation  and  a  living  one. 

And  the  same  difference,  even  in  its  most  minute 
details,  holds  good  between  speculative,  or  as  we 
may  call  it  star-gazing,  sociology  and  sociology  as 
a  practical  science ;  for  is  it  not  one  of  Mr.  Spen- 
cer's most  important  and  interesting  contentions 
that  these  very  irregularities  of  the  earth's  surface 

—  these  lands,  seas,  plains,  valleys,  and  mountains 

—  which,  when  compared  with  the  mass  of  the 
earth,  are  so  absolutely  inappreciable,  constitute 
some  of  the  most  important  of  the  '' external  fac- 
tors "  of  human  history  and  civilisation  1  And  the 
same  holds  good  of  the  inequalities  of  the  human 
intellect.  They  may  be  nothing  to  the  social  star- 
gazer,  but  to  the  social  politician  they  are  everything. 

So  much,  then,  for  two  of  the  most  shallow 
sophisms  that  ever  imposed  themselves  on  pre- 
sumably serious  reasoners.     We  will  now  turn  to 


THE   GREAT  MAN'S  DEBT  TO   THE  PAST     71 
those    two   other    arguments    in   which    the    case      booIci' 

.  .  Chapter  3 

against  the  great  man  finds  its  main  support,  and 
which,  however  misleading  they  may  be,  must  be 
examined  at  greater  length.     In  both  of  these  the  as  for  the  two 

1 .      .  .  '11  r      1  •     o'lier  argu- 

distmctly  exceptional  character  of  the  great  man  is  ments,  which 
assumed,  or  at  all  events  is  not  denied,  but  it    is  ^an'sgreft-^^* 
represented  as  being,  if  it  exists,  not  properly  the  "hi^'it^j" ^fs^"^ 
great  man's  own.     The  first  argument  refers  it  to  own, 
aggregates  of  external  conditions  —  the  knowledge 
accumulated  for  the  great  man's  use,  the  character 
of  his  fellow-citizens,  who  are  ready  to  carry  out  his 
orders  —  and  generally  to  what  Mr.  Bellamy  calls  his 
"  social  inheritance  and  e^ivironmentr     The  second 
argument  refers  it  to  the  great  man's  line  of  an- 
cestors, insisting  that  he  inherits  from  them  his  own 
exceptional  capacities,  which  capacities  his  ancestors 
acquired  by  being  members  of  society,  and  of  which 
it  is  accordingly  contended  that  society  is  ultimately 
the  source. 

Now  on   both   these  arguments,  before  we  con-  t^ey  are  both 

.  ,  1  -I'll  •  1  1         •    •    •  ^"""^  specula- 

sider  them  in  detail,  there  is  one  broad  criticism  to  tiveiy,  but  are 
be  made,  which  applies  to  both  equally.     There  is  umrue.^jr 
a  certain  sense  —  a  remote  and  speculative  sense  —  irrelevant; 
in  which    they  are    both  of   them   quite    true,  and 
indeed  are  almost  truisms ;    but  for  practical  pur- 
poses they  are  either  not  true  at  all,  or  if  true  are 
altogether  irrelevant;   and  it  is  necessary  to  show 
the  reader,  by  a  few  simple  examples,  that  in  the 
doctrine  that  statements  can  be  at  once  true  and 
not  true  there  is  no  philosophical  hair-splitting,  and 
no  Hegelian  paradox,  but  merely  the  assertion  of  a 


72  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I  fact  which,  when  once  attention  has  been  called  to  it, 
common  sense  will  perceive  to  be  as  obvious  as 
it  is  important. 

It  was  just  now  observed   that  the  same   thing 

can  be  great  and  not  great,  according  to  the  things 

with  which  we  compare  it.     In  the  same  way  the 

same  statement  may  be  true  or  not  true,  according 

to  the  nature  of  the  discussion  on  which  it  is  brought 

just  as  state-     to  bear.     Let  us  take  as  an  example  those  familiar 

Averages         statements  of  fact  which  are  given  in  terms  of  aver- 

donstf'gooS  ages.     If  the  vast  majority  of  any  given  population 

may  be  true     ^^^  \^  height  bctwecn  the  limits  of  five  feet  six 

and  relevant  •'  "^ 

for  one  pur-  and  six  fcct,  the  statement  that  a  man's  average 
and  irrelevant  height  is  from  fivc  fcct  scvcu  to  fivc  fcet  eight 
for  another.  y^Q^\^  ^g  a  truth  most  important  to  the  producers 
of  ready-made  overcoats.  But  if  half  the  population 
were  two  feet  high,  and  half  rather  more  than  nine 
feet,  to  give  the  average  stature  as  something  like 
five  feet  seven  would  be  for  the  coatmakers  the 
most  absurd  misstatement  imaginable,  and  would 
lead  them  to  make,  if  they  acted  on  it,  garments 
that  would  fit  nobody. 

Let  us  turn  from  the  question  of  the  truth  of  a 
statement  to  the  question  of  its  mere  relevance, 
and  we  can  illustrate  what  has  been  said  by  an 
example  equally  homely.  In  the  transference  of 
goods  by  rail,  these  have  to  be  sorted  according  to 
bulk,  weight,  shape,  fragility,  perishability,  and  so 
forth.  In  deciding  which  are  to  be  sent  by  fast 
trains,  and  which  by  slow,  the  primary  question  will 
be  that  of  perishability.     When  the  perishable  and 


IRRELEVANT  TRUISMS  73 

the  non-perishable  shall  have  been  separated,  and  ^ooki 
they  are  being  placed  on  the  trains  allotted  to  them, 
the  primary  questions  will  be  those  of  shape,  weight, 
and  fragility.  But  so  long  as  the  preparatory 
separation  is  in  progress,  to  assert  that  the  goods 
possess  any  of  these  latter  characteristics  will  be 
wholly  irrelevant,  no  matter  how  true.  Boxes  of 
fish  will  not  be  put  with  book  parcels  because 
neither  of  them  are  fragile,  or  because  they  are 
both  oblong;  and  each  characteristic,  and  every 
classification  based  on  it,  will  be  either  relevant  or 
irrelevant,  full  of  meaning  or  meaningless,  according 
to  what  question,  out  of  a  considerable  series,  has 
to  be  answered  at  the  moment  by  the  ofRcials  who 
superintend  the  business. 

And  now  let  us  go  back  to  the  two  arguments 
that  are  before  us ;  and  we  shall  be  prepared  to  see 
how,  though  true  for  the  speculative  philosopher, 
they  have  no  meaning,  or  only  a  false  meaning,  for 
any  practical  man. 

We  will  first  take  that  which  is  expressed  with  thus  the  argu- 

*■  ment  that  the 

sufficient  plainness  in  the  passage  quoted  from  Mr.  great  man 
Sidney  Webb,  and  which  insists  on  the  great  man's  fa'^uities  to  his 
debt  to  society  generally,  not  for  his  external  circum-  fhrough'his"'^ 
stances,  but  for  his  personal  character  and  capacities.  JJ^^^J^"/" 
The  idea  involved  in  it  is  very  easy  to  grasp.     The  which  helped 

.      ,  ......  to  develop  his 

great  man  s  congenital  superiority  is  an  inheritance  ancestors. 
from  his  superior  ancestors ;  but  his  ancestors  would  speculative 
not  have  had  it  to  hand  on  to  him  if  they  had  not  ^^''^^' 
been  forced  to  develop  such  superiorities  as  they 
possessed  by  exerting  them  in  a  competitive  struggle 


74  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I      -with  the  srreat  mass  of  their  contemporaries.     Thus 

Chapters         ,  °  ^      ,      .  •         r  i  . 

the  mass  of  their  contemporaries  formed  a  strop  or 
hone  on  which  the  superior  faculties  of  these  men 
were  sharpened ;  and  the  great  man  of  to-day,  to 
whom  the  superior  faculties  have  descended,  owes 
them  accordingly,  not  to  his  own  ancestors  only,  but 
to  the  mass  of  inferior  men  who  struggled  with 
them,  and  were  worsted  in  the  struggle.  In  other 
words,  the  greatness  of  the  exceptional  man  has 
really  been  produced  by  the  whole  body  of  society  in 
the  past ;  and  the  results  of  it  ought  to  be  divided 
amongst  the  whole  body  of  society  in  the  present. 
Now  that  the  above  line  of  argument  has  a 
leads  to  certain  kind  of  truth  in  it,  it  is  hardly  necessary  to 

nothing  but  ,-,.,.  ...  , 

absurdities  if  obscrvc ;  and  for  biologists,  psychologists,  and  spec- 
prlct^cafufe."  ulativc  philosophcrs  generally,  such  truth  as  it 
possesses  may  no  doubt  be  of  value ;  but  that  this 
truth  has  no  relation  whatever  to  practical  life,  and 
no  applicability  to  any  one  of  its  problems,  can  be 
seen  by  considering  the  kind  of  results  we  shall 
arrive  at,  if,  adopting  the  reasoning  of  Mr.  Webb 
and  his  friends,  we  merely  carry  it  out  to  the  more 
immediate  of  its  logical  consequences. 

Let  us  begin  with  their  reasoning,  so  far  as 
it  concerns  the  past.  If  the  inferior  competitors 
who  were  beaten  by  the  great  man's  ancestors  are 
to  be  credited  with  having  helped  to  produce  the 
talents  by  which  they  were  themselves  defeated, 
and  must  therefore  be  held  to  have  had  a  claim  on 
the  wealth  which  these  talents  produced,  which 
claim   has   descended   to  the   inferior  majority  of 


TRUISMS  AND  ABSURDITIES  75 

to-day,  the  same  claim  might  be  advanced  by  any  ^°°k  ^ 
weaker  nation  which,  after  a  series  of  battles, 
succumbs  finally  to  the  stronger.  In  the  Franco- 
German  war  the  French  might  have  said  to  the 
Germans,  "You  acquired  by  fighting  with  us  the 
faculties  which  have  enabled  you  to  conquer  us. 
Your  strength,  therefore,  in  reality  belongs  to  us, 
not  you;  and  hence  justice  requires  that  you  should 
give  us  back  Alsace."  In  the  same  way  it  might 
be  urged  that  all  the  idle  apprentices  of  the  past 
have,  by  the  warning  they  afforded,  stimulated  the 
industry  of  the  industrious,  and  therefore  in  abstract 
justice  had  a  claim  on  their  earnings. 

Let  us  now  take  Mr.  Webb's  reasoning  so  far  as  For  if  the  great 

workers  owe 

it  concerns  the  present,  and  we  shall  find  that  it  their  greatness 
results  in  similar  fantastic  puerilities.  If  the  great  p°ast  sode°y!  ° 
man  of   to-day  owes  his  greatness  to  society  as  a*^^!"^"'^^^ 

Jo  J  shirk  work  owe 

whole,  it  is  to  society  as  a  whole  that  the  idle  man  their  idleness  to 

1   •      •  11  1  -1  1   •  'I-  1       '*■'  and  if  the 

owes  his  idleness,  the  stupid  man  his  stupidity,  the  former  deserve 
dishonest  man  his  dishonesty ;  and  if  the  great  man  TauerXse'rve^ 
who  produces  an  exceptional  amount  of  wealth  can,  JJj°en""'^^' 
with  justice,  claim  no  more  than  the  average  man 
who  produces  little,  the  man  who  is  so  idle  that  he 
shirks  producing  anything  may  with  equal  justice 
claim  as  much  wealth  as  either.     His  constitutional 
fault,  and  his  constitutional  disinclination  to  mend 
it,  are  both  due  to  society,  and  society,  not  he,  must 
suffer.     And  the  same  thing  holds  good  of  every 
form  of  economic  incompetence. 

The    absurdity  of    Mr.  Webb's   position  will  be 
seen  yet  more   clearly  when  we  see  how  it  looks 


76 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  I 
Chapter  3 


The  same 
argument 
applies  to 
morals ;  and  if 
accepted,  we 
should  have  to 
admit  that 
nobody  really 
did,  or  was 
really  re- 
sponsible for, 
anything. 


when  stated  in  the  language  of  Mr.  Bellamy. 
''^  Nine  hundred  and  ninety-nine  parts  out  of  the 
thousand  of  every  majts  produce  are  the  result  of 
his  inheritance  and  his  environment.^''  Now  if  this 
proposition  has  any  practical  application,  it  must 
mean  that  the  whole  living  population  —  great  men 
and  ordinary  men,  labourers  and  directors  of  labour 
—  who  are  commonly  held  to  be  the  producers  of 
the  income  of  Great  Britain  to-day,  really  produce 
of  it  only  one  farthing  in  the  pound ;  and  hence,  if 
we  still  persist  in  considering  the  proposition  a 
practical  one,  we  shall  be  forced  to  conclude  that  the 
whole  of  the  living  population  might  at  any  given 
moment  stop  work  altogether,  or  fall  into  a  trance 
like  the  Seven  Sleepers  of  Ephesus,  and  the  pro- 
duction would  continue  with  hardly  an  appreciable 
diminution. 

Again,  if  the  proposition  has  any  practical  bearing 
on  economics,  it  must  necessarily  have  a  bearing 
precisely  similar  on  morals.  If  a  man  of  to-day 
produces  only  a  thousandth  part  of  what  he  seems 
to  produce,  it  is  equally  evident  that  he  does  only  a 
thousandth  part  of  what  he  seems  to  do.  Let  us 
see,  if  we  accept  this  theory,  to  what  sort  of  con- 
clusions it  will  lead  us.  One  conclusion  to  which  it 
will  lead  us  at  once  is  the  following  —  that  each 
of  us  is  responsible  only  for  a  thousandth  part  of 
his  actions ;  and  from  this  will  follow  others  more  re- 
markable still.  Since  the  holiest  man  has  elements 
of  evil  in  him,  and  the  worst  man  elements  of  good, 
the  good  deeds  for  which  we  honour  the  saint  may 


THE   GREAT  MAN'S  SOCIAL  INHERITANCE     11 

really  be  the  result  of  his  antecedents,  and  his  few  ^^^"^  ^ 
faulty  deeds  may  be  all  that  we  are  to  attribute  to 
himself ;  whilst,  conversely,  the  criminal's  antecedents 
may  have  been  the  cause  of  all  his  crimes  and  vices, 
and  he  may  himself  have  done  nothing  but  some 
acts  of  unnoticed  kindness.  It  will  be  thus  im- 
possible to  form  any  true  judgment  of  anybody ;  for 
the  real  St.  Peter  may  have  been  merely  a  false  and 
truculent  ruffian,  and  the  real  Judas  Iscariot  may 
have  been  fit  for  Abraham's  bosom.  And  yet  even 
these  conclusions  deducible  from  the  premises  of 
Mr.  Bellamy  are  sane  when  compared  with  those 
deducible  from  the  premises  of  Mr.  Sidney  Webb; 
for  Mr.  Bellamy  would  allow  a  man  to  be  responsible 
for  a  thousandth  part  of  his  actions  at  all  events, 
whilst  Mr.  Sidney  Webb  would  not  allow  that  any- 
body either  did  or  was  responsible  for  anything. 

And   now,    finally,    let    us    turn    to    that    other  Finally,  let  us 

1   .    1  1  1  •       •  1  T  r  ^'^^  *^*  argu- 

argument  which  seeks  to  ehmmate  the  causality  of  mem  ti.at  most 
the  great  man,  not  by  proving  that  he   owes  his  grdt  man  does 
superior  brain-power  to  society,  but  by  proving  that  past^^fscover- 
superior    brain-power    has    little    to    do    with    his  iesandachieve- 

.  ....  ,      .  ments,  to  which 

achievements,  their  principal  cause  being  the  ap-  he  does  but 
pliances,  the  opportunities,  and  the  accumulated  * 
knowledge  at  his  command ;  and  that  these,  at  all 
events,  are  due  not  to  himself,  but  others  —  to  the 
efforts  of  past  generations,  and  the  legacy  they  have 
left  to  the  present.  This  is  the  argument  which  is 
mainly  relied  upon  by  Mr.  Spencer.  He  insists 
on  the  fact  that  none  of  the  great  inventors  or 
discoverers   could   have  made  their   discoveries  or 


78 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  I 
Chapter  3 


If  this  argu- 
ment means 
anything 
practical,  it 
must  mean 
that  greatness 
is  commoner 
than  it  is 
vulgarly 
thought. 


inventions  if  centuries  of  past  progress  had  not 
prepared  the  way  for  them.  ''A  Laplace,  for 
iiistance,''  he  says,  '"'could  not  have  got  very  far 
•with  the  Mecanique  Celeste  unless  he  had  bee7t 
aided  by  the  slowly  developed  system  of  mathematics, 
which  we  trace  back  to  its  beginnings  amongst  the 
ancient  Egyptians'' ;  and  his  many  other  illustra- 
tions are  all  of  the  same  kind. 

If  we  consider  the  meaning  of  this  argument 
carefully  we  shall  see  that  its  logical  outcome  is  not 
to  deny  to  the  great  man  all  superiority  whatsoever, 
but  to  exhibit  his  superiority  as  being  less  than  it  is 
usually  supposed  to  be.  Laplace,  Mr.  Spencer  would 
say,  may  have  been  personally  a  little  above  the  level 
of  his  contemporaries,  but  he  owed  most  of  his  eleva- 
tion to  sitting  on  the  shoulders  of  his  predecessors. 
Now  if  this  reduction  of  the  great  man's  reputed 
greatness  to  such  very  small  proportions  has  any 
practical  meaning,  it  must  mean  that  greatness  is 
not  only  less  than  it  is  supposed  to  be,  but  is  also 
a  great  deal  commoner,  and  more  easily  procurable. 
Whatever  any  particular  great  man  has  done,  could 
have  been  done,  if  he  had  not  done  it,  by  an  in- 
definite number  of  others.  Let  us  then  take  as 
an  illustration  some  definite  task,  and  see  how  far 
such  reasoning  has  any  practical  application.  Our 
illustration  shall  be  taken  from  the  domain  of  art; 
for  the  great  artist,  according  to  Mr.  Spencer's  special 
statement,  owes  his  greatness  to  the  achievements 
of  past  generations,  just  as  the  great  mathema- 
tician  does,  or   the    great   thinker,    or   the    great 


THE  FACT  OF  INHERITANCE  IRRELEVANT 


79 


inventor.     Let  us  suppose,  then,  that  it  is  desired  to      ^ook  i 
decorate  some  pubHc  hall  with  pictures  worthy  of 
Titian  or  Michael  Angelo,  or  to  open  some  national  But  is  tins  the 
theatre  with   a  new  play  worthy  of   Shakespeare,  s^a^espeie^ 
The  great  question  will  be  where  to  find  the  artist  fnl'e'cSeits 
or  poet  whose  works   shall    even    approximate    to  ^^"^^  siiake- 

.  ■*•■'•  speares  more 

these  ideals  of  excellence;  and  any  one  who  numerous? 
knows  anything  about  either  pictures  or  poetry 
will  know  that  to  find  him  is  a  well-nigh  hopeless 
task.  Now  what  conceivable  help,  what  con- 
ceivable meaning,  would  there  be  in  Mr.  Spencer's 
coming  forward  and  telling  the  public  that  the 
greatest  poet  or  artist  is  the  product  of  the  same 
conditions  that  have  produced  any  one  of  them- 
selves ?  Mr.  Spencer  has  actually  made  this  precise 
statement.  Let  us  therefore  refer  to  the  terms  in 
which  he  has  done  so.  "  Given  a  Shakespeare'' 
he  says,  "  and  what  dramas  could  he  have  written^ 
without  the  multitudi^tous  conditions  of  civilised  life 
—  without  the  various  traditions  which,  descending  to 
him  from  the  past,  gave  wealth  to  his  thought,  and 
without  the  language  which  a  hundred  generations 
had  developed  and  enriched  by  use  ?  " 

Mr.  Spencer  could  not  have  put  his  own  case 
more  clearly;  and  the  more  clearly  it  is  put,  the 
more  easy  it  is  to  answer  it,  and  to  show  that  for 
practical  men  it  has  no  meaning  whatsoever.  The 
answer  to  the  question  he  asks  is  not  only  obvious, 
but  contains  at  the  same  time  the  solution  of  the 
whole  problem  we  are  discussing.  It  will  inevitably 
take   the   form   of   another  question.      Given   the 


8o  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I      conditions    of   civilised    life,  and  the   traditions  of 

Chapter  3  1  i        /^ 

England  and  its  language,  as  they  were  under  Queen 
Elizabeth,  how  could  these  have  produced  dramas 
like  King  Lear  and  Hamlet,  unless  England  had 
happened  to  possess  that  unique  phenomenon  —  a 
Shakespeare  ?  Could  a  Bottom  have  written  these 
dramas,  or  a  Dogberry,  or  a  Sir  Toby  Belch  ?  Or 
could  Sir  Thomas  Lucy,  or  any  of  the  "  poetasters  " 
satirised  by  Ben  Jonson  ?  Or  could  the  actors, 
Kemp,  Jones,  and  Bryan,  who  assisted  in  the  repre- 
sentation of  these  dramas  upon  the  stage  ?  The 
answer  is,  of  course,  No.  And  yet  these  men 
Shakespeare's  inherited  the  same  language  that  Shakespeare  did : 

contempora-  00  j.       ^  ^ 

rieshadthe     the  thrcc  last  had  the  advantage  of   knowing  his 

same  national     -  ,  1        1  j  t>i  .i        1      11 

antecedents     iinest  passagcs  by  heart.      1  he  weaver,  the  bellows- 

bliTthey^coiiid  rnender,  the  constable,  the  Justice  of  Peace,  had  behind 

notdowhat  he  thgj^  the  Same  traditions  that  Shakespeare  had,  and 

were  surrounded  by  the  same  "  multitudinous  co7idi- 

tions  "  of  civilisation.    But  out  of  these  conditions  one 

man  alone  was  capable  of  eliciting  the  results  elicited 

by  Shakespeare.    The  real  explanation  of  the  whole 

difficulty  —  the  difficulty  involved  in  the  fact  that 

whilst    the   argument    of    Mr.    Spencer    and    Mr. 

Bellamy  is,  in  a  speculative  sense,  not  merely  true 

but  a  truism,  it  is  utterly  untrue  in  any  practical 

sense  —  is  as  follows :  Every  human  being  living  at 

any  given  time  is,  as  Mr.  Spencer  says,  an  inheritor 

Men  inherit     of   the    past ;    but    mcu    inherit    the    past    in    very 

in^so'faras^    different  degrees.     They  inherit  the  knowledge  of 

SsfrnXte  it.     the  past  only  according  to  the  degree  to  which  they 

acquire  it ;  the  language  of  the  past  only  according 


MEN  INHERIT  UNEQUALLY  8i 

to  their  skill  in  manipulatins:  it ;  the  inventions  of    ^^°°^  ^ 

.       ,  .       .  .  Chapters 

the  past  only  according  to  their  skill  in  reproducing 
and  using  them. 

The    extraordinary    confusion    of     thought    in-  socialists  say 

,.,,_  ,  ..  .,         ,.        ,.  that  inventions 

volved  in  Mr.  Spencer  s  position  is  locahsed  in  an  once  made 
argument  constantly  employed  by  socialists  —  that  nfon  propeni^. 
'*  inveittions  once  made  become  commo7t  property r 
Except  the  earliest  and  simplest  of  them,  they  no 
more  become  common  property  than  the  count- 
less facts  and  figures  buried  in  Parliamentary  Blue- 
Books  become  the  property  of  every  new  member 
of  Parliament,  or  than  encyclopaedic  knowledge 
becomes  the  property  of  every  one  who  happens  to 
inherit  an  edition  of  the  Encyclopcsdia  Britannica; 
or  than  the  power  of  deciphering  the  hieroglyphics 
which  are  preserved  in  the  British  Museum  be- 
comes the  property  of  every  cabman  who  drives 
his  vehicle  along  Great  Russell  Street.  It  is  per- 
fectly true  that  the  discovery  of  each  new  por- 
tion of  knowledge  enables  men  to  acquire  it  who 
never  might  have  discovered  it  for  themselves ;  but  This  is  abso- 

,       ,  ,  '  lutely  untru6< 

as  the  acquisition  of  the  details  of  knowledge 
becomes  facilitated,  the  number  of  details  to  be 
acquired  increases  at  the  same  time;  and  the  in- 
creased ease  of  acquiring  each  is  accompanied  by 
an  increased  difficulty  in  acquiring  all,  or  even  in 
assimilating  those  which  are  practically  connected 
with  one  another.  A  mechanic,  for  instance,  could 
with  ten  minutes'  attention  comprehend  the  principle 
involved  in  a  cantilever  bridge,  but  to  design  and 
construct  a  bridge  such  as  that  which  now  spans  the 

6 


82  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I      Forth,  with  its  spans  of  six  hundred  yards  and  its 

altitudes  of  aerial  steel,  implies  an  assimilation  of 

our  multitudinous  existing  knowledge,  such   as   is 

The  discover-  hardlv  to  be  found  in  a  score  of  enorineers  in  Europe. 

ies  and  inven-  •'  a  l 

tions  of  the      Or  to  tum  oncc  more  to  Mr.  Spencer's  example  of 
property  of      Shakcspcarc,  whilst  all  Shakespeare's  contemporaries 
'can'ab°sorband  ^ad  the  samc  antecedents  that  he  had,  the  same  line 
use  them.        gf  thiukcrs  behind  them,  and  the  same  developed 
vocabulary,  Shakespeare's  mind  was  capable  of  ab- 
sorbing much  of   the    national    inheritance,  whilst 
the  great  mass  of  his  contemporaries  could  compara- 
tively absorb  very  little. 
Thus  the  intro-      Wc   are  thus  brought  back  to  the  point  from 

duction  of  the        i-i  iiTrr  • 

past  into  the  which  wc  sct  out  —  uamcly,  the  differences  m  capa- 
kaverthe  city  by  which  men  are  distinguished  from  one 
differences  be-  another  I  and  we  see  that  all  the  reasonings  of  our 

tween  the  great  '  o 

man  and         modcm  sociolosfists    havc,   for   practical   purposes, 

others  un-  ...  ...  . 

diminished,  left  thcsc  differences  undimmished.  The  difference 
between  the  great  man  and  the  ordinary  man  is  not 
made  less  by  the  fact  that  they  both  of  them  owe 
much  to  a  common  past,  any  more  than  the  differ- 
ence between  a  hogshead  of  water  and  a  wine-glass 
is  made  less  by  the  fact  that  both  have  been  filled 
from  the  same  stream. 

The  conclusion,  therefore,  of  the  whole  matter  is 
as  follows.  In  the  first  place,  whatever  may  be  the 
speculative  significance  of  Mr.  Spencer's  contention, 
which  Mr.  Bellamy  expresses  with  the  arithmetical 
precision  of  an  accountant,  that  each  living  genera- 
tion does  only  a  minute  fraction  of  what  it  seems  to 
do,  or  of  arguments  like  Mr.  Sidney  Webb's,  that 


GREAT  MAN  A  TRUE  CAUSE  OF  PROGRESS    83 

each  living  generation  does  nothing  at  all  of  what      ^°°''  ^ 

it  seems  to  do,  the  mass  of  living  men  at  all  events 

do  something,  in  the  very  real  sense  that  if   they 

did  not  do  it  they  would  die;  and  the  doing  of  this  i^ «he ordinary 

•'  ,       '-'  man  does  any- 

something   is   for  them  the  whole  of   life,  and  all  thing,  the  great 
practical  problems  depend  on  the  manner  in  which  great  deal 
they  do  it.     Such  being  the  case,  it  follows,  in  the  ^°^^'" 
second  place,  that  however  much  the  ordinary  man 
does,  the  great  man  does  a  great  deal  more.     There- 
fore, if  the  ordinary  man  does  any  of  the  things  that 
he  seems  to  do,  and  causes  any  of  the  events  that 
he  seems  to  cause  —  if  he  ploughs  the  farm  that  he 
seems  to  plough,  and  lays  the  bricks  that  he  seems 
to  lay  —  indeed  we  may  add,  if  he  eats  the  dinners 
that  he  seems  to  eat  —  the  great  man  in  a  precisely 
similar  sense  is  the  cause  of  those  changes  and  of 
that  progress  which  he  seems  to  cause.     Hence  of 
these  changes  he  is,  for  the  practical  sociologist,  not 
merely  the  proximate    initiator,  whose    action  and  ^"'^ '"  p^^.^''* 

•'  ^  cal  reasoning 

peculiarities    may   be    neglected,    but    a   true    and  he  is  a  true 

,  .    -        ,  .  .     ,  .    cause  for  the 

primary  cause,  on  which  the  attention  of  the  soci-  sociologist. 
ologist  must  be  concentrated;  and  just  as  in  action 
it  is  impossible  to  do  without  him,  so  in  practical 
reasoning  it  is  impossible  to  go  behind  him. 

The  reader  has  now  been  shown  the  absolute 
futility  of  that  train  of  reasoning  by  which  even  so 
keen  a  thinker  as  Mr.  Spencer  has  persuaded  him- 
self that  he  can  get  rid  of  the  causality  of  the  great 
man,  and  in  which  every  socialistic  reformer  who 
has  risen  above  the  level  of  a  demagogue  has 
attempted  to  find  a  scientific  foundation  for  his  im- 


84  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I      possible  castle  in  the  air.     But  the  demolition  and 

Chapters      '■ 

exposure  of  these  mischievous  and  miserable  fallacies 
shall  not  be  entrusted  only  to  the  arguments  that 
have  been  brought  to  bear  on  them.  The  validity 
of  these  arguments  shall  now  be  finally  substantiated 
by  direct  appeal  to  a  sociologist  whose  identity  may 
surprise  the  reader.  This  is  none  other  than  Mr. 
Spencer  himself,  who,  when  he  forgets  to  be  the 
conscious  expositor  of  his  theory,  and  turns  aside 
to  illustrate  some  particular  point  by  examples 
drawn  from  the  experience  of  common  life,  is  con- 
stantly contradicting,  in  a  most  remarkable  but 
entirely  unconscious  way,  the  fundamental  principle 
which  he  has  deliberately  set  himself  to  establish. 
^nlfuTMr^'^  In  the  seventh  chapter  of  his  Study  of  Sociology, 
Spencer  un-     being  incidentally  concerned  to  insist  on  the  iniquity 

consciously  ad-  ,      ,  •      i  •  r  i  t  -i  i 

mitsthis.  and  the  mischievousness  of  war,  he  describes  how 
Europe,  during  the  earlier  years  of  this  century, 
was  visited  by  certain  disasters,  far-reaching  and  hor- 
rible, from  the  consequence  of  which  the  world  has 
hardly  yet  recovered.  These  disasters  consisted  of 
slaughter,  plunder,  pestilence,  agony,  rape,  and  ruin ; 
and  to  say  nothing  of  their  results  on  those  whom 
they  left  alive,  they  resulted  in  some  two  million 

He  declares     yiolcut  and  unneccssary  deaths.     And  how  does  Mr. 

that  the  Napo-  I'l 

leonicwars  Spcnccr  cxplam  these  appallmg  phenomena?  He 
durtolhr^  who  declares  that  we  should  learn  nothing  about 
greatness  of  social  causation  "-should  we  read  ourselves  blind  over 
Napoleon.  /^^  biographies  "  of  all  the  great  rulers  of  the  world, 
explains  them  by  tracing  them  to  one  sole  and 
single   cause ;    and   this,  he   says,   was   the   genius 


MR.  SPENCER  AND  NAPOLEON  85 

and  personality  of  Napoleon.  "  Out  of  the  sa^iguin-  ^°°^  ^ 
ary  chaos  of  the  Revolution^^^  he  writes,  "  rose  a 
soldier  whose  immense  ability^  joined  with  his 
absolute  unscrupulous7tess,  made  him  now  general, 
now  consul,  now  autocrat.  The  instincts  of  the 
savage  were  scarcely  at  all  qualified  in  him  by 
what  we  call  moral  sentiments.  .  .  .  And  all  this 
slaughter,  all  this  suffering,  all  this  devastation, 
was  gone  through  —  "  Let  us  pause  and  ask  why 
it  was  gone  through,  according  to  Mr.  Spencer. 
Does  he  say  it  was  gone  through  because  of 
*'  aggregates  of  past  conditio7ts "  and  the  influence 
of  antecedent  generations  ?  Far  from  it.  He  says, 
"  All  this  was  gone  through  because  one  man  had  a 
restless  desire  to  be  despot  over  all  me^t." 

But  perhaps  Mr.  Spencer  may  have  a  defence 
ready.  He  may  tell  us  that  the  influence  of 
Napoleon  was  merely  that  of  a  military  leader, 
which  influence  he  has  excepted  from  his  theory 
of  general  causes.  To  this  it  must  be  answered 
in  the  first  place  that  Napoleon  was  at  all  events 
not  a  leader  in  "  early "  or  ''primitive "  warfare,  to 
which  Mr.  Spencer's  exception  is  specifically  and 
emphatically  limited.  Mr.  Spencer  consequently 
shows  us,  by  his  own  practical  reasoning,  that  this 
theoretical  limitation  of  which  he  made  so  much 
cannot  be  maintained  for  a  moment,  and  that  what- 
ever is  true  of  great  leaders  in  a  primitive  war,  he 
himself  recognises — all  his  theories  notwithstanding 
—  as  equally  true  of  them  in  the  most  advanced 
stages   of   civilisation.     But  a  far  more   important 


86 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  I 
Chapter  3 


He  defends 
patents  be- 
cause they 
represent  the 
very  substance 
of  the  inven- 
tor's own 
mind; 


answer,  and  one  taken  from  himself,  is  still  in 
reserve  —  an  answer  which  clenches  the  whole 
matter,  and  shows  us  that  Mr.  Spencer,  in  his 
dealings  with  practical  life,  really  recognises  great 
men  as  exercising  in  the  arts  of  peace  precisely  the 
same  kind  of  causality  which  Napoleon  exercised 
in  war. 

Let  us  turn  to  Mr.  Spencer's  treatise  on  Social 
Statics,  and  to  the  section  of  it  in  which  he  treats 
of  patents  —  or  as  he  himself  describes  them  ''the 
rights  of  property  in  ideas'.'  He  begins  by  com- 
plaining that  the  right  of  patenting  "  inventions, 
patterns,  or  designs'"  is  not  recognised  as  being 
based  on  any  moral  right  at  all,  but  is  generally 
regarded  as  a  kind  of  "■privilege''''  or  '■'■  rewardr 
"  The  prevalence  of  such  a  belief^'  says  Mr.  Spencer, 
"  is  by  no  means  creditable  to  the  national  co7tscience, 
...  To  think^'  he  exclaims,  "  that  a  sinecurist 
should  be  held  to  have  a  '  vested  interest '  in  his  office, 
and  a  just  title  to  compensation  if  it  is  abolished ;  and 
yet  that  an  invention  over  which  710  end  of  mental  toil 
has  been  spent,  a7id  07t  which  the  poor  mecha^iic  has 
laid  out  perhaps  his  last  sixpence  —  a^i  invention 
which  he  has  completed  entirely  by  his  own  labour 
and  with  his  own  7naterials  —  has  wrought,  as  it 
were,  out  of  the  very  substance  of  his  own  mind — 
should  not  be  acknowledged  as  his  property  I " 

Social  Statics  is  one  of  Mr.  Spencer's  earlier 
works.  Let  us  now  consult  his  latest,  the  third  and 
final  volume  of  his  Principles  of  Sociology;  and 
here  we  shall    find    this  same  admission    that   the 


MR,  SPENCER    ON  SIR  H.  BESSEMER         87 
great  man's  achievements  are  wrousfht  not  out  of      ^ooki 

o  .   .  °  Chapters 

aggregates  of  conditions,  but  "  out  of  the  very 
substance  of  his  ow7i  mind^'  emphasised  by  him  as 
a  practical  truth,  with  all  the  vigour  of  a  practical 
man.  In  his  chapter  on  the  ''''Interdependence  and 
Integration  of  Industrial  l7istitutio7is''  he  dwells  with  ^'^^  ^,^  ^^^'*^- 

*=>  •'  ^  utes  the 

much  eloquence  on  the  almost  incalculable  benefits  modem  im- 
that  have  resulted,  and  extended  themselves  through  steei  manu- 
the  whole  industrial  world,  from  certain  improve- H^Bessenfer. 
ments  introduced  into  the  manufacture  of  steel. 
And  to  what  were  these  improvements  due  ?  Mr. 
Spencer  answers  this  question  not  merely  by  ad- 
mitting, but  by  insisting  with  the  fervour  of  a 
hero-worshipper,  that  they  were  due  to  the  genius 
of  one  single  man,  namely  Bessemer;  and  so  obvi- 
ous does  this  truth  appear  to  him,  that  he  devotes 
an  indignant  footnote  to  denouncing  the  governing 
classes  for  not  being  sufHciently  alive  to  it,  and  for 
conferring  on  a  man  who,  ''out  of  the  very  substance 
of  his  own  mind,'''  had  wrought  such  gigantic  and 
universally  beneficial  changes,  no  higher  reward 
than  the  title  of  Sir  Henry  Bessemer — ''an  honour'* 
he  says,  "  like  that  accorded  to  a  third-rate  public 
official  on  his  retirement,  or  to  a  provincial  mayor 
on  the  occasion  of  the  Queens  fubilee^ 

After  this,  what  more  need  be  said  ?  Here  we 
have  Mr.  Spencer  himself,  the  moment  he  touches 
the  practical  side  of  life,  contemptuously  brushing 
aside  the  whole  of  his  speculative  theory  and  admit- 
ting, or  rather  insisting,  with  the  most  unhesitating 
and  uncompromising  vigour,  that  "  the  phenomena  of 


88  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I  social  evolution','  even  if  they  do  not  result  entirely, 
as  Carlyle  would  have  it,  from  the  actions  of  great 
men,  yet  cannot,  at  all  events,  be  possibly  explained 
without  them;  and  that  great  men,  their  natures, 
and  the  details  of  their  active  lives  are  primary 
factors  to  be  studied  by  every  practical  sociologist, 
and  are  not  to  be  merged  in  "■society',''  in  "■  ante- 
cede7its,"  and  in  ''aggregates  of  conditions. " 
So  much,  then,      ^]^q   practicallv    independent    character   of    the 

being  estab-  *  ... 

lished,  we  must  great  mau's  causality  will  be  yet  more  apparent 
difficuitLs  °  at  another  stage  of  our  argument,  and  we  shall 
suggested  by  it.  ggg  that  the  whole  structure  of  all  civilised 
societies  depends  on  it.  But  we  may,  for  the 
present,  regard  it  as  being  sufficiently  established, 
and  the  absurd  and  unreal  character  of  the  attempts 
to  get  rid  of  it  demonstrated.  So  much,  then, 
being  assumed,  we  will,  in  the  following  chapter, 
consider  two  objections  of  a  character  very  different 
to  any  of  those  of  which  we  have  now  disposed. 
They  are  objections  which  will  very  possibly  have 
suggested  themselves  to  the  reader's  mind,  but 
which,  instead  of  conflicting  with  the  truth  which 
has  been  just  elucidated,  will  be  found,  when  ex- 
amined carefully,  to  emphasise  and  to  enlarge  its 
significance. 


CHAPTER   IV 

THE    GREAT   MAN    AS    DISTINGUISHED    FROM    THE 
PHYSIOLOGICALLY    FITTEST    SURVIVOR 

The  two  objections  to  which  reference  has  just  been  it  may  be 

I  1-1  1  •  •  1  r  objected  that 

made  are  connected  with  two  doctrines,  neither  of  modem  sodoi- 
which  has  thus  far  been  submitted  to  any  detailed  afher?as"° ' 
examination,  and  one  of  which   has   indeed   been  f"^^'^-  "^^^^*^* 

'  the  great  man, 

hardly  so  much  as  alluded  to,  but  which  are  both  ^°^  '*  ^^opts 

,  .  .  .  .  the  doctrine  of 

intimately  associated,  in  the  estimation  of  the  world  the  survival  of 
at  large,  with  contemporary  science,  and  more 
especially  with  contemporary  sociology.  One  of 
these  doctrines  is  that  of  the  survival  of  the  fittest. 
The  other  is  that  which,  more  or  less  distinctly,  is 
suggested  at  the  present  time  by  the  much-abused 
word  "  evolution."  When  the  reader  thinks  of  the 
doctrine  of  the  survival  of  the  fittest,  when  he 
reflects  on  the  fact  that  Mr.  Spencer  is  an  avowed 
disciple  of  Darwin,  and  that  Mr.  Spencer's  own 
disciples  are  constantly  making  allusion  to  "//^<? 
rivalry  of  existence "  and  the  "  successfuls  and  the 
unsuccessfuls''  he  may  be  tempted  to  ask  himself 
if  it  can  be  really  true  that  Mr.  Spencer  has  elim- 
inated the  great  man  from  his  system  after  all.  On 
the  other  hand,  when  the  reader  thinks  of  evolution, 

89 


go 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  I 
Chapter  4 

It  may  be 
asked,  on  the 
other  hand, 
what  place  the 
great  man  has 
in  an  exclu- 
sively evolu- 
tionary theory 
of  progress. 


The  fittest  sur- 
vivor is  not  the 
same  as  the 
great  man. 


He  plays  a 
part  in  prog- 
ress, but  not 
the  same  part. 


which,  whatever  it  may  mean,  at  all  events  means 
a  progress  essentially  different  from  the  achieve- 
ments of  particular  individuals,  he  may  wonder  in 
v/hat  way  the  doctrine  of  evolution  can  be  reconciled 
with  any  doctrine  which  has  the  achievements  of 
individuals  for  its  basis. 

We  will  take  these  two  points  in  order.  With 
regard  to  the  survival  of  the  fittest  in  the  competi- 
tive struggle  for  existence,  the  great  fact  which  it  is 
necessary  to  make  clear  is  as  follows ;  and  it  is  one 
which  our  contemporary  sociologists  have  altogether 
failed  to  perceive.  In  the  evolution  of  societies, 
just  as  in  the  evolution  of  species  —  in  the  evolution 
of  man  as  a  social  being,  as  in  the  evolution  of  man 
as  an  animal  —  the  struggle  for  existence  has  played 
an  important  part ;  but  in  social  evolution  the  part 
played  by  it  is  very  far  from  being  that  which  is 
popularly  supposed,  nor  does  the  survival  of  the 
fittest  in  any  way  correspond  with  the  position  and 
influence  claimed  for  the  great  man.  Certain  of  the 
phenomena  of  progress  are  no  doubt  produced  by 
it,  but  they  are  as  different  from  those  which  the 
great  or  exceptional  man  produces,  as  is  the  move- 
ment of  the  earth  round  the  sun  from  its  movement 
round  its  own  axis.  In  order  to  understand  this, 
let  us  first  consider  carefully  how  progress,  as  the 
result  of  the  struggle  for  existence,  is  explained  by 
our  contemporary  sociologists.  The  matter  is  put 
succinctly  and  very  clearly  in  the  following  passage 
from  Mr.  Kidd's  Social  Evohction. 

^^ Progress  everywhere"  he  says,  ""from  the  begin- 


REPRODUCTION  OF  THE  FITTEST  91 

ning  of  life^  has  been  effected  in  the  same  way,  and  is      ^ook  i 
possible  ift  no  other  way.     It  is  the  result  of  selection 
and  rejection.     In  the  human  species,  as  in  every 
other  species  which  has  ever  existed,  no  two  indi-  The  fittest 
viduals  of  a  generatio7t  are  alike  in  all  respects ;  there  vivin'g.  raise 
is  infinite  variatio7i  within  certain  narrow  limits,  jevef o'fThe 
Some  are  slizhtly  above  the  averap^e  in  a  'barticular  '"^^^'  ^"^  p'^°' 

o        y  d  r  mote  progress 

direction y  as  others  are  slightly  below  it;  and  it  2>$- only  in  this 
only  whe7i  the  conditions  prevail  that  are  favourable 
to  the  prep  07iderati7ig  reproductio7i  of  the  for7ner,  that 
adva7ice  in  a7iy  directio7t  becomes  possible.  To 
formulate  this  as  the  immutable  law  of  prog7^ess  si7ice 
the  begi7i7iing  of  life  has  been  one  of  the  p7'i7icipal 
results  of  the  biological  scie7ice  of  the  7ii7zetee7ith 
century.  ...  To  ptit  it  i7i  words  used  by  Professor 
Flower  i7i  speaki7ig  of  huma7i  society,  '  Prog7^ess  has 
been  due  to  the  opportunity  of  those  i7tdividuals  who 
are  a  little  superior  i7i  some  respects  to  their  fellows 
of  asserting  their  superiority,  a7id  of  C07iti7tui7ig  to 
live  a7id  of  promulgating  as  a7i  inherita7ice  that 
superiority^  " 

The  entire  Spencerian  position  as  regards  the 
social  struggle  for  existence  is  here  given  us  in  a 
nutshell.  The  competitive  struggle  is  a  process 
which  produces  progress  by  means  of  the  manner 
in  which  it  affects  men  in  general.  In  any  com- 
munity the  means  of  subsistence  are  being  constantly 
appropriated  by  the  members  who  are  a  little 
stronger  than  the  rest,  whilst  those  who  are  weaker 
have  an  insufficient  portion  left  them.  The  latter 
therefore  die  early  themselves ;  or  breed  no  children ; 


92  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I      or  breed  children  who  die  early ;  whilst  the  former 

Chapter  4        .  .  ...... 

live  long,  and  breed  children  who  live  likewise ;  and 
of  these  children  there  is  always  a  certain  percentage 
in  whom  are  reproduced  the  superior  qualities  of 
their  parents.  Thus  the  weaker  members  of  the 
community  are  always  dying  out,  whilst  stronger 
members  not  only  become  more  numerous,  but 
more  efficient  as  individuals  also.  In  other  words, 
the  Darwinian  struggle  for  existence  produces 
progress  by  raising  the  general  average  of  efficiency. 
It  has  nothing  to  do  with  a  few  men  towering  over 
the  rest.  It  works  by  producing  a  simultaneous 
rise  of  all.  The  superior  "  assert  their  authority  " 
not  by  commanding  their  inferiors,  but  merely  by 
"  continuing  to  live  "  and  having  children  as  superior 
as  themselves.  In  this  way,  to  quote  an  illustration 
from  Mr.  Spencer,  the  progressive  races  of  Europe 
have  reached  a  stage  of  development  which  makes 
possible  amongst  them  the  appearance  of  men  like 
Laplace  or  Newton,  an  event  which  could  not  occur 
amongst  the  Hottentots  or  the  Andaman  islanders. 
It  will  thus  at  once  be  clear  that  the  theory  of  the 
survival  of  the  fittest  explains  progress  by  reference 
The  great  man  to  an  ordcr  of  facts  totally  distinct  from  those 
ress  by  being  iuvolvcd  iu  thc  influcucc  claimcd  for  the  great  man. 
Whilst  the  theory  of  survival  is  illustrated  by  the 
superiority  of  Europeans  to  Hottentots,  the  great- 
man  theory  is  illustrated  by,  and  depends  on,  the 
superiority  of  men  like  Newton  to  the  great  mass 
of  Europeans. 

What  relation,  then,  do  these  two  explanations 


superior  to  his 
contempora- 
ries. 


PROGRESS  A  DOUBLE  MOVEMENT  93 

bear  to  each  other?     In  a  direct  way  they  are  not      soo'*^ 

.  .  Chapter  4 

related  at  all.     They  neither  conflict  with  each  other 
nor  overlap   each  other.      They  are  both  of  them  The  movement 
true ;  but  true  as  explaining  different  sets  of  phe-  doubhf^'^"^  *^ 
nomena.     One  of  the  great  errors  of  which  our  mod- 
ern sociologists  are  guilty  consists  in  their  failure  to 
perceive  that  social  progress  is  not  a  single  move- 
ment but  the  joint  result  of  two,  which  differ  from 
each  other  —  to  repeat  what  was  said  just  now  — 
quite  as  much  as  do  the  two  movements  of  the  earth. 
The  difference  between  them  will  become  instantly 
clear  to  us  if  we  will  turn  our  attention  merely  to  one  movement 
the  single  obvious  fact  that  the  two  take  place  at  siowf^the'^^other 
different  rates  of  speed,  the  one  set  of  changes  being  '^p''^- 
slow,  like  the  succession  of  years ;  the  other  set  of 
changes  being  rapid,  like  the  succession  of  days. 
The  general  rise  in  capacity  which   distinguishes 
the  modern  civilised  nations  from  primitive  man,  or 
from  the  lowest  savages  of  to-day,  and  which  has 
been  due  to  what  Mr.  Kidd  calls  "  the  preponder-  The  survival  of 
atmg  reproduction  of  individuals  slightly  above  the  causes  the 
average^'    has    been    the   work    of    an   incalculable  ment.'"°^^ 
number  of  centuries.     It  has  been  so  slow  that,  in 
many  respects  at  all  events,  it  has  been   indistin- 
guishable   during   the  course  of   several  thousand 
years.      The   great  thinkers   amongst  the   ancient 
Egyptians   were    not   congenitally   inferior   to    the 
great  thinkers  of  to-day.      The  brain  of  Aristotle 
was  equal  to  the  brain  of  Newton;  whilst  the  masons 
whose  hands  constructed  the  Coliseum  and  the  Par- 
thenon knew  as  much  of  their  craft  as  those  who 


94  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I      constructed  the  Imperial  Institute.     But  with  this 

Chapter  4  ... 

slowness  in  the  rise  of  the  general  level  of  capacity, 
let  us  compare  the  progressive  results  achieved 
within  some  short  period.  We  cannot  do  better 
than  take  the  past  hundred  years,  and  consider  the 
progress  made  in  the  material  arts  of  life.  How 
the  whole  spectacle  changes !  Within  that  short 
period,  at  all  events,  no  one  will  venture  to  main- 
tain that  the  average  congenital  capacities  of  our 
own  countrymen  have  been  enlarged.  We  are 
not  wittier  than  Horace  Walpole,  more  polite  than 
Lord  Chesterfield,  more  shrewd  and  sensible  than 
Dr.  Johnson ;  whilst  it  is  easy  to  see  by  reference 
to  those  trades,  such  as  the  building  trade,  which 
science  and  invention  have  done  comparatively 
little  to  alter,  that  the  natural  efficiency  of  the 
average  workman  is  no  greater  now  than  in  the 
days  of  our  great-great-grandfathers.  And  yet  dur- 
ing that  short  period  what  an  astounding  progress 
has  taken  place !  To  sum  it  up  in  a  bald  eco- 
nomic formula,  whilst  the  capacities  of  the  average 
Englishman  have  remained  altogether  stationary, 
the  economic  productivity  per  head  of  the  popula- 
tion of  this  country  has  during  the  past  century 
trebled,  and  more  than  trebled  itself. 

This  remarkable  comparison  between  the  rapidity 
of  actual  progress  and  the  extreme  slowness  of  the 
biological  development  resulting  from  the  survival 
of  the  fittest  in  the  Darwinian  struggle  for  existence, 
will  be  enough  to  show  anybody  that  progress  is  not 
one  movement  but  two ;  and  whilst  the  survival  of 


EVOLUTION  AND  INTENTIONAL  PROGRESS    95 
the  fittest  explains  the  slow  and  almost  impercepti-      ^^^'^  ^ 

1  -11  Ml  Chapter  4 

ble  movement,  the  rapid  and  perceptible  movement 
is  explained  by  the  leadership  of  the  greatest.  It  is 
with  the  rapid  movement  alone  that  the  practical  The  rapid 

.    ,.■.  .  ..  ri-  movement  is 

sociologist  IS  concerned  ;   and  hence  for  him   the  caused  by  tiie 
great  man,  not  the  fittest,  is  the  important  factor.      ^^^^  '°^" 

Let  us  now  consider  what  is  meant  by  the  process 
called  social  evolution,  regarded  as  something  dis- 
tinct  from  those   intentional   advances    made   and  ^^"^^  ^^  *° 

evolution  — 

maintained  by  the  genius  of  great  men.  To  under-  what  does  the 
stand  this,  we  must  consider  what  is  meant  by 
evolution  generally.  Mr.  Spencer  defines  it  in 
terms  of  "  the  homogenous  "  and  "  the  heterogefious  "; 
and  from  his  own  point  of  view  we  may  accept  his 
definition  as  correct.  But  facts  have  many  aspects ; 
and  according  to  the  purpose  with  which  we  deal 
with  them  they  will  require  different  definitions, 
which,  though  none  of  them  are  incompatible  with 
the  others,  will  have  between  themselves  no  appar- 
ent resemblance.  Thus  the  biologist's  definition  of 
a  man  will  be  quite  distinct  from  the  theologian  s ; 
and  the  dangerous  illness  of  a  great  party  leader 
will  be  one  phenomenon  for  his  followers,  and  quite 
another  for  his  doctor.  In  the  same  way  Mr. 
Spencer's  definition  of  evolution,  however  admira- 
ble it  may  be  from  a  certain  point  of  view,  is  not 
exhaustive.  It  entirely  leaves  out  of  sight  those 
characteristics  of  the  process  which  it  is  necessary 
before  all  things  that  the  practical  sociologist  should 
understand. 

To   reach   a   definition  that   will   include   these 


96  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I  let  US  begin  by  fixing  our  attention  on  that 
order  of  facts  which  formed  the  special  study  of 
Its  great  prac-  Darwin,  and  in  connection  with  which  the  theory 
istic. asput  of  evolution  became  first  known  to  the  world; 
Da^in.^J  that  and  Ict  US  ask  what  was  the  greatest  and  the 
the doct°ineof  ^nost  notorious  effect  produced  by  Darwinism  on 
design,  or       human   thousrht  generally.     Its  greatest  and  most 

divine  inten-  .  °         °  ■;.  °  ,  . 

tion;  notorious  eiiect  was  to  disprove,  or  rather  render 

superfluous,  the  old  theory  which  explained  the 
varieties  of  organic  life,  by  referring  them  to  the 
design  of  some  quasi-human  intelligence.  Accord- 
ing to  the  old  theory,  every  species  of  living  thing, 
from  the  lowest  to  the  highest,  was  produced  by  the 
power  and  purpose  of  one  supreme  Mind,  who 
adapted  the  frame  and  faculties  of  each  to  a  pre- 
arranged set  of  circumstances  and  the  fulfilment  of 
certain  needs.  According  to  the  theory  of  evolution, 
associated  with  the  name  of  Darwin,  these  results 
were  accomplished  by  purpose  and  intelligent  power 
likewise,  only  not  by  the  power  and  purpose  of  one 
supreme   external    Mind,   but  by   the   power   and 

and  yet.  ac-     purposc   of   the   Hvinsf   thinsfs   themselves.      Each 

cordingtoDar- f.    .^,.  ,  .    ^  ^  .  ,.i., 

win.  species  liviug  thing  chose  its  matcs,  reproduced  its  kind, 
the"intent^onof  huutcd  for  food,  fought  with  Hvals,  and  either  con- 
Hv?andpropl°-  ^ucrcd  or  was  conquered  by  them,  in  obedience  to 
gate.  the   promptings   of   its    own   instinctive    purposes. 

These  were  the  motive  power  of  the  whole  evolu- 
tionary process.  The  variety  and  development  of 
organic  life,  as  we  know  it,  did  not  result  indeed 
from  one  great  intention,  but  it  did  result  from  an 
infinity  of  little  intentions. 


UNINTENDED  PROGRESS  97 

Now  SO  far  the  theory  of  design  and  the  theory  of      ^^^^  ^ 
evolution  very  closely  resemble  each  other ;  but  here 
we  come  to  the  point  of  essential  difference  between  spedes,  there- 
them.    According  to  the  theory  of  design,  the  varieties  toThe^evoL-"^ 
and  gradations  of  organic  life  were  not  only  the  result  re°uT/onnten. 
of  intention  in  the  supreme  Mind,  but  were  also  them-  *|o"'  ^^^  "o< 

^     ^  ,  the  result 

selves  the  exact  result  intended.  According  to  the  intended, 
evolutionary  theory,  although  they  were  the  result 
of  an  infinity  of  intentions,  not  one  of  the  living 
things,  from  whose  intention  they  resulted,  intended 
them.  They  were  the  by-product  of  actions  under- 
taken for  entirely  different  ends  —  that  is  to  say,  for 
the  benefit  of  the  individual  creatures  who  under- 
took them.  This  is  the  essential  and  this  is  the 
peculiar  character  with  which  the  theory  of  evolu- 
tion invested  them.  It  presented  to  the  mind  the 
extraordinary  phenomenon  of  a  single  series  of 
actions  producing  a  double  series  of  results  —  the 
intended  and  the  unintended,  the  latter  of  which, 
though    entirely   different   from    the    former,   was  Evolution,  in 

fact  is  the 

equally  orderly,   equally  reasonable   and    coherent,  reasonable 
Evolution,  in  fact,  as  revealed  to  us  in  the  physio-  uXtTnded. 
logical  world,  is,  for  the  philosopher,  neither  more 
nor  less  than  this  —  the  reasonable  sequence  of  the 
unintended. 

But  this  definition  of   evolution  does  not  apply  ibis  is  as  true 
only  to  development  in  that  world  of  facts  studied  uon  as  it  is  of 
by  Darwinian  science.     It  is  equally  applicable  to  *''°^°^''*'* 
the  process  of  social  evolution  also.     Indeed  social 
evolution  is  even  more  strikingly,  though  not  more 
truly,  than  physiological   evolution,  the  reasonable 
7 


98  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Booki      sequence  of  the  unintended.     How  this  is  can  be 

Chapter  4  ^.  .  ,  .  ,  . 

easily   made   plain ;    and   when    once    the   idea   is 
grasped,  which  the  definition  embodies,  it  will  be 
seen  that  social  evolution,  although  it  is  no  doubt 
different  from  all   or  from   any  of   those  changes 
deliberately  produced  by  the  agency  of   the  great 
man,  instead  of  excluding  these  changes,  or  elim- 
inating the  great  man  as  the  cause  of  them,  is  a 
process  which   depends  altogether  upon   him   and 
them,    and    that,    instead   of    obscuring    the   great 
man's  importance,  it  only  exhibits  it  in  a  stronger 
and  clearer  light. 
Many  of  the        Let  US  take  then  our  definition  of  evolution  as 
ditions  of  any  thc   rcasonablc   sequence   of   the   unintended,  and 
E^S^past.  ^PP^y  ^^^  i^^^  embodied  in  it  to  that  aggregate  of 
t^en'ckd'^b  ^""     conditions,  either  in  our  own  or  any  similar  period. 
nobody  in  the  amongst  which    the  great   man  works.     All   these 
conditions,  such  as  the  knowledge  which  he  finds 
accumulated,  the  inventions  which  he  finds  in  use, 
the   political    and    the  economic  conditions  of   his 
country,  are,  taken  as  a  whole,  the  result  of  no  one 
man's  genius.     It  is  equally  obvious  that  they  do 
not,  in  their  incalculably  complex  entirety,  represent 
any  one  man's  intention,  or  even  the  joint  intention 
of  any  number  of  men  acting  in  concert.     Printing, 
for  instance,     for  cxamplc,  and  railway  travelling  have  produced  a 
social  effects  of  number  of  social  results  never  dreamed  of  by  the 
chelp  pn^ming.  ^^^^  who  perfected  our  locomotives  and  our  steam 
printing  presses.     Accordingly,  when  any  great  man 
of  to-day  initiates  some  fresh  social  change,  whether 
as  an  inventor,  a  director  of  industry,  a  politician,  or 


INTENDED  PROGRESS  AND    UNINTENDED    99 

a  religious  teacher,  a  larc^e  part  of  his  achievement      ^°°'' ' 
consists   in  his  manipulation    and    refashioning  of 
results  of  past  human  action,  which  can  be  set  down  Therefore. 

.  -11  1  •  •  r  whenever  any 

to  the  credit,  or  ascribed  to  the  intentions,  of  no  great  man 

i.-i        1  1  •>       1  iT'T'j        1  T"!  •    L     produces  some 

individual,  and  no  body  of  individuals.     1  he  society  change  in- 
of  the  past  intended  these  no  more  than  the  great  [fa"s',o"^ork"^ 
men  of  the  past.     They  are  results,  that  is  to  say,  ^'t^  unin- 
which  come  all  under  the  heading  of  the  unintended,  materials. 
But  when  we  consider  the  great  man's  achievement 
thus,  we  shall  not  only  witness  the  grouping  of  many 
of  the  factors  essential  to  it  into  one  heterogeneous 
but   logically   coherent   class,    as   the    unintended. 
When  such  a  grouping  has  taken  place,  we  shall  see 
that  there  remains  behind  an  equally  coherent  and 
equally  striking  residuum  —  namely,  the  social  results 
and    conditions    that    have    been    obviously    and 
notoriously   intended.     These    may    not   be   found 
existing  apart  from  the  former ;  but  though  in  con- 
junction or  combination  with   them,   they  will    be 
visible  as  a  distinct  and  separate  element,  and  their 
true  importance  as  a  factor  in  social  progress  will 
begin  to  be  apparent  to  the  mind  the  moment  their 
specific  peculiarity,  as  just  described,  is  apprehended. 

Let  us  take  a  few  examples  which,  owing  to  their  we  can  see 

....  ...  'his  m  the 

magnitude  and  familiarity,  will  be  at  once  intelligible,  progress  of 
Our  first  shall  be  taken  from  the  histories  of  art  and 
of  speculative  philosophy.  In  each  of  these  domains 
of  human  activity  and  achievement  we  find  those 
phenomena  of  development  to  which  it  is  now 
customary  to  apply  the  name  of  evolution.  Thus 
we  hear  of   the  evolution  of  philosophy  from  the 


100  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I  crude  guesses  of  Thales  to  the  elaborate  system  of 
Aristotle.  We  hear  of  the  evolution  of  the  Greek 
drama  from  the  exhibitions  of  Thespis  with  his  cart 
to  the  tragedies  of  v^schylus  and  of  Sophocles; 
and  similarly  we  hear  of  the  evolution  of  the  English 
drama  from  such  exhibitions  as  miracle  plays  or 
Gammer  Gurtons  Needle  to  tragedies  such  as 
Hamlet  and  comedies  such  as  As  You  Like  It.  And 
to  all  such  examples  of  development  the  word 
evolution  is  applied  with  perfect  accuracy ;  for  there 
is  in  each  an  obvious  and  orderly  sequence  of  the 
also  in  the       Unintended.      Aristotle's    philosophy   was   in   part 

progress  of.  ,  ri-  i  tt  i  i 

philosophy,     dcrivcd  from  that  or  his  predecessors.    He  employed 

existing  materials  so  as  to  produce  a  result  which 

was  not  intended,  indeed  was  not  even  imagined, 

by  those  who   originally   got   them   together   and 

fashioned  them,  and  which  would  never  have  been 

reached  by  Aristotle  himself,  if  his  predecessors  had 

not  thus  unintentionally  assisted   him.     None  the 

less,  however,  does  the  Aristotelian  philosophy,  as 

its  author  gave  it  to  the  world,  embody  the  deliberate 

intention  of   his  profound  and  unrivalled  genius; 

and  it  is  only  because  it  embodies  this  intended 

element    that    it    constitutes    an    advance   on   the 

philosophies  that  went  before  it.    Similarly,  though 

And  yet  in       Sophoclcs  and  Shakcspcare,  in  constructing  their 

imende?   ^   dramas,  each  profited  by  the  achievements  of  the 

orTrrgreatef  dramatists  who  had  gone  before  them,  and  though 

than  the         ^j^g  ^rt  of   cach  would  doubtless  have  been  more 

unintended. 

crude  and  imperfect  had  he  come  into  the  world  a 
generation  or  two  before  he  did,  yet  the  part  played 


EVOLUTION  AND   THE    WALTER  PRESS     loi 
by   evolution   in    the    production   of    Hamlet  and      ^^^'^^ 

.  .      .  .  Chapter  4 

Antigone  is  totally  distinct  from,  and  is  altogether 
dwarfed  by,  the  part  played  by  the  genius  and  the 
intentions  of  their  great  authors. 

Let  us  now  turn  to  invention  and  applied  science ;  we  see  the 

same  thing  in 

and  the  history  of  social  progress,  as  connected  the  history  of 
with  and  derived  from  them,  will  show  the  same  printing  press. 
two  elements  —  the  unintended  and  the  intended, 
similarly  related  and  similarly  coexistent.  A 
brilliant  illustration  of  this  fact  is  provided  for 
us,  in  one  of  his  books,  by  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer, 
though  he  himself,  with  a  curious  blindness  and 
perversity,  uses  it  not  to  illustrate  but  to  ob- 
scure the  point  on  which  we  are  now  dwelling. 
The  illustration  referred  to  is  the  history  of  the 
press  by  which  The  Times  is  printed,  which  imple- 
ment, according  to  Mr.  Spencer,  is  the  result 
altogether  of  evolution.  " In  the  first  place''  he 
says,  "  this  automatic  printi^ig  machine  is  lineally 
descended  from  other  automatic  printing  machiftes 
.  .  .  each  presupposing  others  that  went  before.  .  .  . 
And  then^  in  tracing  the  more  remote  ajitecedents.,  we 
find  an  ancestry  of  hand  printing  presses^  He 
further  points  out  that  this  press  implies  not  only  an 
ancestry  of  former  presses,  but  also  the  existence  of 
the  machinery  used  in  making  it,  and  again  how  this 
machine-making  machinery  has  a  distinct  ancestry 
of  its  own,  which  includes  the  fact  of  the  abundance 
of  iron  in  England.  Geometry,  physics,  chemistry, 
also,  he  says,  played  their  part  in  the  process ;  and 
he  winds  up  by  referring  to  purely  social  causes. 


X02  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I  Why,  he  asks,  was  the  Walter  press  produced  ?  In 
order  that  "  wilk  great  promptness  "  it  might  "  meet 
an  enormous  demajtdy 

It  is  difficult  to  imagine  a  better  illustration  than 
this  of  the  part  played  by  evolution  in  the  domain  of 
mechanical  invention.  It  is  perfectly  evident  that 
the  mass  of  discoveries  and  inventions  which 
preceded  and  paved  the  way  for  the  final  invention 
in  question  were  due  to  men  who  had  no  idea  in 
their  heads  of  such  a  machine  as  a  steam-driven 
It  was  the       printinoj   press   at   all.      When    printinar   was    first 

result  of  many    .  i  i  -i        r         \1T^ 

kinds  of  un-  mvcntcd,  stcam-powcr  was  undreamed  of.  When 
progreL,  con-  thc  steam-cnginc  was  being  perfected  as  a  means  of 
combined  by  driving  machinery,  the  inventors  had  no  specific 
intention.  intention  of  applying  this  force  to  the  printing  press. 
The  men  whose  genius  and  energy  in  the  seven- 
teenth and  eighteenth  centuries  laid  the  foundation 
of  the  English  iron  trade,  and  with  it,  as  Mr. 
Spencer  says,  the  foundation  of  "■machine-making 
generally'^  in  all  probability  never  even  saw  a  news- 
paper, and  could  not  have  conceived  the  possibility 
of  collecting  enough  news  daily  to  fill  as  much  as 
one  page  of  The  Times.  The  mathematicians  and 
chemists  to  whose  work  Mr.  Spencer  alludes  most 
probably  never  gave  a  thought  to  the  practical  ap- 
plication of  their  discoveries,  and  knew  as  little  of  the 
process  of  printing  as  they  did  of  Chinese  grammar. 
But  let  us  give  to  these  facts  all  the  weight  we  can. 
Let  us  accept  the  antecedents  that  made  the  Walter 
press  possible  as  not  only  sequences  but  also  con- 
currences of  the  unintended ;  and  yet  the  part  played 


INTENTION  AND   THE    WALTER  PRESS     103 
bv  the  o:reat  man  remains  as  essential,  and  remains      ^^'^'^  ^ 

^  ^  Chapter  4 

as  large  as  ever.  The  fact  that  the  Walter  press 
could  never  have  existed  unless  Caxton's  press  had 
existed,  and  that  Caxton  never  foresaw  the  future 
development  of  his  apparatus,  does  nothing  to 
disprove  the  fact  that  in  the  development  of 
printing  generally,  genius  like  Caxton's  was  an 
indispensable  agent,  and  one  which  stamped  its 
character  on  the  whole  sequence  of  inventions  which 
it  inaugurated.  Nor  again  does  the  fact  that  an 
invention  like  the  Walter  press  implies  not  only 
a  direct  sequence  of  inventions  and  discoveries, 
but  also  a  concurrence  of  many  separate  sequences, 
such  as  the  invention  and  discoveries  of  chemists, 
of  machine-makers,  and  producers  of  iron,  do 
anything  to  disprove  the  importance  and  the  ne- 
cessity of  the  part  played  by  the  men  to  whose  gen- 
ius the  press  was  directly  due.  For  although  the 
co-existence  of  the  separate  sequences  referred  to 
—  the  parallel  march  of  progress  in  many  separate 
arts  and  sciences  —  may  have  been  altogether  un- 
intended by  any  of  those  concerned  in  them,  what 
was  emphatically  not  unintended  was  their  final  con- 
currence—  the  fact  of  their  being  brought  together 
for  one  definite  purpose.  This  was  due  to  the  de- 
liberate intention  of  exceptional  men  with  strong 
synthetic  powers,  who  appropriated  and  connected 
the  achievements  of  various  other  men.  Chemistry, 
geometry,  the  production  of  iron,  and  the  develop- 
ment of  machinery  for  machine-making  would  never 
have    worked    together    to    produce    an    automatic 


I04 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  I 

Chapter  4 


Evolution,  m 
fact,  is  the 
unintended 
result  of  the 
intentions  of 
great  men. 


printing  press  had  the  Immediate  inventors  of  such 
an  implement  not  coerced  them  into  their  service, 
and  forced  them  to  contribute  to  a  deliberately 
planned  result. 

The  state  of  the  case  is  this.  Let  us  take  any 
civilised  society  at  any  period  we  will,  and  examine 
it  in  the  act  of  advancing  to  the  next  stage  of  its 
development.  We  shall  find  that  its  existing  condi- 
tions consist  partly  of  results  intended  by  particular 
great  men  whose  past  actions  have  produced  them, 
and  partly  of  results  neither  foreseen  nor  intended 
by  anybody.  Thus  at  the  present  day  amongst 
our  social  conditions  we  have  the  telegraph  and  the 
railway  system  —  both  of  them  results  intention- 
ally produced  by  individuals;  and  we  have  also  a 
variety  of  new  wants  and  habits,  new  methods  of 
conducting  trade  and  government,  which  have  been 
produced  by  these,  but  which  were  neither  intended 
nor  even  thought  of  by  the  inventors  of  the  loco- 
motive, or  by  Wheatstone  and  Cooke  when  their 
wires  at  last  realised  the  long-forgotten  dream  of 
the  Italian  Jesuit  Strada.^  Thus,  though  social 
conditions  at  any  given  time  are  a  compound  of 
intended  results  and  unintended,  and  even  though 
we  may  admit  that  at  any  given  time  these  last  are 
more  widely  diffused  than  the  former,  these  last 

1  Strada,  an  Italian  Jesuit,  in  the  seventeenth  century  invented,  or 
rather  imagined,  communication  by  electric  telegraph ;  and  his  idea 
actually  comprised  the  use  of  two  needles  moved  by  two  magnets,  these 
magnets  being  connected  in  such  a  way,  that  by  the  movement  of  either 
of  them  the  needle,  actuated  by  the  other,  could  be  made  to  point  to 
such  and  such  letters  on  a  dial. 


EVOLUTION  THE  RESULT  OF  INTENTION    105 
are  themselves  the  children  of  intention  once  re-      Booki 

Chapter  4 

moved.  Great  men  may  not  havei  meant  to  pro- 
duce them,  but  they  have  arisen  from  conditions 
which  great  men  did  mean  to  produce;  and  they 
could  not  have  arisen  in  any  other  way.  And  here 
we  are  brought  to  a  fact  more  obvious  and  more 
important  still.  Before  any  further  advance  in  social 
civilisation  can  be  made,  other  existing  conditions, 
whether  intentionally  produced  or  not,  require  to 
be  intentionally  re-combined  and  acted  on  by  men 
whose  enterprise,  whose  intellect,  and  whose  con- 
structive imagination  mark  them  out  from  their  fel- 
lows as  the  pioneers  of  the  future.  We  are  thus  once 
more  confronted  with  the  fact  already  insisted  on  — 
that  the  social  conditions  of  a  time  are  the  same 
for  all,  but  that  it  is  only  exceptional  men  who  can 
make  exceptional  use  of  them,  and  turn  them  into  a 
stepping-stone  on  which  their  generation  may  rise 
higher. 

Social  evolution,  therefore,  in  so  far  as  it 
is  other  than  biological,  may  be  defined  as  the 
unintended  result  of  the  intentions  of  great  men; 
and  this  definition  at  once  brings  us  back  to  the 
truth  which  was  urged  in  the  first  chapter  as  the 
starting-point  of  our  argument,  and  which  can  now 
be  put  before  the  reader  with  an  added  force  and 
clearness. 

It  was  said  in  the  first  chapter  that  sociologists  The  unin- 
have  succeeded  m  deahng  with  those  wider  social  evolved 
phenomena  which  are  exhibited  by  social  aggregates  pro'^isTs 
as  wholes,  and  which  are  interesting  and  significant 


io6  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  I      to  the   speculative  or  religious   philosopher.     The 

truth  of   this  statement  is  illustrated  by  what  has 

what  concerns  just  been  Said  about  evolution.     If  evolved  phenom- 

the  speculative  i   •    i  i   m  • 

philosopher,  eua  are  phenomena  which  exhibit  a  reasonable 
sequence,  and  have  yet  been  intended  by  no  animal 
or  human  mind,  it  is  open  to  the  thinker  to  argue 
that  they  must  have  been  intended  by  the  mind  of 
some  higher  power ;  and  a  new  gate  is  opened  into 
the  Eden  of  theological  speculation,  from  which 
man  was  driven  when  he  first  ate  of  the  tree  of 
scientific  knowledge. 

The  intended        g^^  whilst  the  busiucss  of  the  speculative  philos- 

element,  which  ^  ^  r  r 

originates  ophcr  is  solcly  with  the  phenomena  that  have  been 

great  man,  is  Unintended,  the  business  of  the  practical  sociologist  is 

LSeSfor  solely  with  the  phenomena  that  have  been  intended, 

practical  p^  momcut's  rcflcction  will  convince  the  reader  that 

purposes. 

this  must  be  so.  The  meaning  of  the  words  prac- 
tical science  is  a  science  from  which  we  can  draw 
practical  advice ;  but  all  advice  implies  an  intended 
end;  and  every  attempt  to  solve  social  problems 
scientifically  must  be  concerned  with  results  which 
we  may  deliberately  set  ourselves  to  produce,  and 
not  with  by-products  which,  ex  hypothesis  are  beyond 
our  calculation.  We  may  study  these  by-products 
of  intention  as  they  have  shown  themselves  in  the 
past ;  but  if  we  do  this,  it  will  be  with  the  object 
of  becoming  able  to  foresee  them  in  the  future.  So 
soon  as  we  can  foresee  them,  we  shall  be  able  to 
intend  their  production ;  and  when  this  happens 
they  will  cease  to  belong  to  the  unintended.  The 
great  man  will  then  consciously  aim  at  them,  and 


EVOLUTION  AND   THE    GREAT  MAN        107 
not   leave   them   to    the    incalculable    chances    of    ^?°°''' 

Chapter  4 

evolution.  It  may  safely  be  said,  no  doubt,  that, 
let  us  study  human  conduct  as  we  may,  unintended, 
or  evolved  phenomena,  will  always  continue  to  form 
a  large  part  of  what  we  mean  by  social  progress; 
but,  as  practical  inquirers,  we  must  put  them  on 
one  side,  and  confine  our  attention  to  those  factors 
in  the  problem  which  either  embody  some  definite 
human  intention  themselves,  or  on  which  we  can 
found,  by  studying  them,  some  definite  intention  of 
our  own.  And  of  such  factors  the  chief  is  the  great 
man,  whose  importance  is  enhanced  rather  than 
dwarfed  by  the  fact  that  his  intellect  and  his  energy 
are  the  causes  not  only  of  great  results  which  he 
intends,  but  also  of  those  others  —  wider,  if  not  more 
important  —  which,  though  neither  intended  nor  fore- 
seen by  himself  or  by  anybody  else,  would,  if  it  were 
not  for  him,  never  take  place  at  all. 


BOOK   II 


CHAPTER   I 

THE     NATURE    AND     DEGREES     OF    THE     SUPERIORITIES 
OF   GREAT    MEN 

That   orreat   men   are   true   causes   of  proQ:ress  is  The  causality 

1-11         T»  T       o  1   •  1  r  11  ,  of  the  great 

admitted  by  Mr.  bpencer  himself  to  be  the  natural  man  being 

•     •  r  i"i         Tirii.!  L  1  j-1  •      established,  we 

opinion  or  mankind.     What  has  been  done,  then,  in  must  consider 
the  preceding  book  is  not  much  more  than  this:   aT'^f  p''^^'^^'^ 

•T  o  what  greatness 

sound  popular  judgment,  which  is  of  the  highest  ^s- 
sociological  importance,  has  been  rescued  from  the 
discredit  cast  on  it  by  the  sophisms  of  modern 
theorists.  These  very  theorists  themselves,  when 
they  reason  as  practical  men,  have  been  shown  to 
the  reader  blowing  all  their  disproofs  of  it  to  the 
winds,  and  holding  and  appealing  to  it  as  tenaciously 
and  as  passionately  as  anybody;  and  it  is  consequently 
given  back  to  us,  with  its  old  authority  unimpaired. 
Sound  popular  judgments,  however,  are  not  science. 
They  lack  what  is  the  essence  of  science  —  that  is  to 
say,  analytical  precision.  We  must  now,  therefore, 
take  this  judgment  with  regard  to  the  great  man, 
and  endeavour  to  invest  it  with  a  meaning  exact  and 
full  enough  to  enable  us  to  apply  it  to  the  detailed 
phenomena  of  society. 

And  here  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer  shall  once  more 


definition  of  it. 


112  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  II      i^gip  us .  fQj.  ^]^js  remarkable  writer,  thousrh  he  fails 

Chapter  i  ^  .  .  .  '  o 

to  recognise  what  he  is  doing,  not  only  appeals  on 
many  critical  occasions  to  the  great-man  theory 
as  an  explanation  of  the  most  important  social 
phenomena,  but  he  is  repeatedly  calling  attention 
throughout  his  sociological  writings  to  those  facts  of 
human  nature  of  which  the  great-man  theory  is  the 
expression.  It  will  be  sufficient  to  quote  a  few 
passages  only. 
Mr.  Spencer         Lgj;  ^g  tum,  then,  to  the  openinsr  pa^es  of  Mr. 

will  help  us  to  ^  .  r  &    r    £> 

a  general  Spcnccr's  Study  of  Sociology  and  consider  what  is 
contained  in  them.  We  shall  find  that  they  are 
entirely  devoted  to  describing  the  abject  mental 
condition  of  by  far  the  largest  portion  of  all  classes 
of  English  society,  from  the  labourer,  the  farmer, 
and  the  Nonconformist  minister  with  his  Bible,  up 
to  "  men  called  educated  "  and  the  most  illustrious 
of  our  historians  and  philosophers.  All  of  them, 
says  Mr.  Spencer,  "  are  slaves  to  unwarranted 
opmions " ;  '''proximate  catises "  are  all  that  the 
majority  of  them  are  able  to  understand.  Nor  does 
he  represent  this  as  some  accidental  result,  due  to 
prejudices  or  deficiencies  in  education  peculiar  to 
our  own  country.  He  represents  it  as  an  inevitable 
result  of  the  character  of  the  human  race.  In  his 
"  Postscript "  to  the  same  volume  he  takes  care  to 
make  his  meaning  plain.  " Most  people''  he  says, 
*'  conclude  quickly  from  small  evidence^'  and  are 
incapable  "  of  comprehending  in  their  totality 
assembled  propositions ^  Indeed,  those  whose 
mental  constitution  is   such    that  they  can  take  a 


MR.  SPENCER    ON  DEGREES   OF  CAPACITY     113 
rational  view  of  "  /ncman  affairs  "  are,  he  proceeds      ^'^^^  ^^ 

1  7     /-        >j        T  T  1  1  Chapter  i 

to  say,  merely  "  a  scattered  few.  He  elsewhere 
divides  society  into  "  the  capable  and  the  incapa- 
ble,^^  the  ^'worthy  and  the  unworthy'''' ;  and  in  the 
''Postscript'"  just  alluded  to  he  mentions  as  an 
admitted  fact  that  in  every  social  aggregate  "  the 
inferior  form  the  majority^  But  a  yet  more  caustic 
passage  remains  to  be  mentioned.  In  this  same 
work,  The  Study  of  Sociology,  he  is  ridiculine:  —  and  "^  ^^'^'^^^  *'^^ 

,  ,  .  ".  ^  human  race 

very  justly  —  the  socialistic  idea  that  the  State  can  into  the  cWer, 
be  endowed  with  any  talent  or  wisdom  beyond  what  lnd°thJsmpid. 
happens  to  be  possessed  by  the  individual  function- 
aries who  compose  the  State.  These  functionaries, 
he  says,  are  merely  "^  cluster  of  men,''  which,  like 
any  other  cluster  taken  at  hap-hazard,  will  comprise 
"  a  few  clever  i^idividuals,  many  ordinary,  some 
decidedly  stupid'" ;  and  he  devotes  pages  to  showing 
by  means  of  multiplied  examples,  how  incapable  the 
ordinary  statesman,  to  say  nothing  of  the  decidedly 
stupid,  has  been  of  promoting  progress  in  even  the 
simplest  ways. 

Mankind  at  large,  then,  according  to  Mr.  Spen- 
cer, may,  roughly  speaking,  be  divided  into  three 
classes  —  the  "  clever "  who  are  few,  the  "  ordi- 
nary''' who  are  the  bulk  of  the  population,  and 
the  ''decidedly  stupid'''  who  form  a  considerable 
residuum ;  and  it  will  appear  from  what  he  says  of 
that  representative  "cluster''  the  State,  that  whilst 
all  real  progress  is  the  work  of  the  clever  few,  the 
"  ordinary  men  "  do  nothing  to  promote  it,  and  "  the 
decidedly  stupid  men  "  impede  it. 

8 


114 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


race  were 
stupid,  it  is 
plain  there 
would  be  no 
progress ; 


nor  would 
there  be  any, 
if  all  the  race 
were  ordinary; 


Book  II  Now  it  must  be  perfectly  obvious  to  the  reader 

Chapter  i  .    \  r  ^  •      ^ 

that  in  this  description  of  mankind  we  have  the 
fundamental  facts  before  us  which  the  great-man 
theory  formulates.  For  let  us  begin  by  supposing 
Now  if  all  the  that  the  entire  human  race  contained  no  individuals 
superior  to  the  "■decidedly  stupid',''  who,  whenever 
they  are  placed  in  official  positions,  do  nothing,  Mr. 
Spencer  declares,  but  commit  the  most  pernicious 
blunders,  either  by  their  irrational  conservatism, 
or  their  still  more  irrational  innovations.  It  is 
obvious  that  in  this  case  the  world  would  never 
have  progressed  at  all.  Let  us  next  suppose  that 
in  addition  to  the  ''decidedly  stupid""  men,  the 
human  race  comprises  also  a  large  proportion  of 
''ordinary''  men,  but  not  a  single  man  who  deserves 
to  be  called  more  than  "ordinary.'"  Could  social 
progress,  as  we  know  it,  have  taken  place  even 
then  .'*  Could  thought,  for  example,  ever  have 
made  any  advances,  had  everybody  been  as  in- 
capable as  Mr.  Spencer's  "  ordinary  "  man  is  of  tak- 
ing a  rational  view  of  human  affairs  —  had  everybody 
been  enslaved,  like  him,  "  to  unwarranted  opinions'^ 
and  been,  like  him,  entirely  lacking  in  the  faculty 
which  enables  a  man  to  comprehend  "assembled 
propositions  in  their  totality'''?  Or  to  put  the 
whole  matter  in  terms  of  a  single  instance,  could 
Mr.  Spencer's  own  system  of  philosophy  have 
been  written  if  he  himself  had  not  been  immensely 
superior  not  only  to  "  ordinary "  men,  but  even  to 
those  rival  thinkers  whom,  in  every  one  of  his 
volumes,   he   treats   with   such   supreme    disdain .? 


MR.  SPENCER  ON  THE  CLEVER  MINORITY    115 
The  answer  of  course  is  No.    Under  such  conditions     ^°°^  ^' 

Chapter  i 

progress  would  have  been  quite  impossible.  Our 
simple  argument  will  accordingly  run  thus.  It  is 
evident  that  those  triumphs  of  thought,  enterprise, 
and  invention  to  which  social  progress  is  due  could 
never  have  been  made  had  the  whole  of  each 
generation  been  as  stupid  and  void  of  character  as 
its  lowest  and  weakest  members.  Therefore  prog- 
ress must  be  due  to  men  who  are  superior  to  the 
""decidedly  stupid.''  Here  we  have  the  great-man 
theory  in  embryo.  But  it  is  equally  evident  that  we 
can  go  a  step  farther,  and  say  that  progress  could 
never  have  taken  place  had  there  been  no  in- 
dividuals who  in  will,  oriorinality,  and  intellect  were  therefore  prog- 
superior  to  "  ordi7iary  men''  Social  progress,  there-  due  to  the 
fore,  must  be  due  to  this  third  class — the  class  which  are^ls  Mr° 
alone  is  capable    of   takino:   "^   rational"  view  of  ^P^"ff  ^.^y^- 

i^  O  a  scattered  few. 

things ;  but  this  class,  as  Mr.  Spencer  tells  us,  con- 
sists of  a  " scattered  few"  and  here  we  have,  in 
Mr.  Spencer's  own  language,  neither  more  nor  less 
than  the  great-man  theory  developed.  We  have  . 
it  developed  in  the  form  of  a  distinct  general  propo- 
sition that  progress  is  due  not  to  mankind  at  large, 
but  to  a  minority  of  exceptional  individuals,  and  in 
this  form,  which    Mr.  Spencer  has  assisted  us   in  This  is  the 

.     .  .       .       .  ,         .  ■,  1  •   1    great-man 

givmg  it,  it  IS  brought  into  actual  accordance  with  theory  reason- 
the  facts  of  social  life,  and,  unlike  the  wild  exaggera-  ^  ^  ^'^^^  * 
tions  of  Carlyle,  it  will  be  found  to  accord  the  more 
closely  with  them  the  more  fully  it  is  analysed. 

The  error  of  writers  like  Carlyle  was  that  they 
took  a  part  for   the  whole.     They  recognised   no 


ii6  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  II     great  men  at  all  except  great  men  of  the  greatest 

kind  —  heroic  figures  which  appeared  once  or  twice 

in  a  century ;  and  as  for  the  rest  of  mankind,  they 

For  great  men  treated    them    in    accordance   with    Mr.    Spencer's 

are  not  ,  ,  *  , 

necessarily      formula,  as  a  mass  of  units,  approximately  equal  in 
cariyie  Capacity.     The  truth  of  the  case  is,  on  the  contrary, 

thought,         ^j^-g .  —  ^j^^^  whatever  is  done  by  great  men  of  the 

heroic  type,  something  similar,  if  not  so  striking,  is 
done  by  a  number  of  lesser  great  men  also;  that  whilst 
the  action  of  the  heroic  great  men  is  intermittent,  the 
action  of  the  lesser  great  men  is  constant ;  and  that 
the  latter,  as  a  body,  although  not  individually,  do  in- 
calculably more  to  promote  progress  than  the  former. 
Let  us  accordingly  make  it  perfectly  clear  that 
when  we  describe  great  men  as  being  a  minority,  or 
nor  divided      a  ''  Scattered  few',''  we  do  not  mean  that  out  of  every 

absolutely  "^  •iiii«  • 

from  all  other   thousaud  mcu  thcrc  are  nme  hundred  and  mnety-mne 
"*^"-  »  ordinary  "  men  and  one  genius ;  or  that  there  are 

(let  us  say)  seven  hundred  who  can  be  described  for 
all  purposes  as  "■ordinary^"  and  two  hundred  and 
ninety-nine  who  can  be  for  all  purposes  described  as 
"  stupid"" ;  and  that  there  is  one  "■clever''''  or  "•great''' 
man  who  towers  over  them  like  an  oak  tree  over 
bramble  bushes.  Nor,  again,  do  we  mean  that 
"greatness'"  is  some  single  definite  quality,  which 
marks  its  possessor  out  like  a  white  man  amongst 
negroes.  Believers  in  extreme  democracy,  who 
very  rightly  discern  in  the  great-man  theory 
the  destruction  of  their  favourite  enthusiasms,  will 
instinctively  seek  to  attribute  some  meaning  such 
as    this    to    its    exponents.      But    the    great-man 


MANY  DEGREES   OF  GREATNESS  117 

theory,  when  properly  analysed  and  explained,  will      ^°'^^  " 
be  found   to  comprise  no  such  absurdities  as  the 
foresfoing:.      When    we    speak    of   "  greatness  "   we  Greatness  is 

°         °  .  -       i-r    .  .        °    1   .    ,         ,  ,     various  both 

mean  a  great  variety  01  einciencies,  which,  though  in  kind  and 
grouped  together  because  they  are  all  exceptional  ^^^^''' 
in  degree,  are  nevertheless  indefinitely  various  in 
kind ;  and,  moreover,  the  degrees  to  which  they  are 
exceptional  are  indefinitely  various  also,  the  degree 
being  in  many  cases  so  low  that  it  is  difficult  to  say 
whether  it  should  be  classed  as  exceptional  at  all. 
In  short,  there  are  as  many  degrees  of  greatness  as 
there  are  of  temperature;  and  it  is  as  difficult  to 
draw  a  line  between  ordinary  men  and  men  whose 
greatness  is  of  a  very  low  degree,  as  it  is  to  draw 
a  line  between  coldness,  coolness,  and  low  degrees 
of  heat.  But  though  it  may  be  questionable 
whether  we  should  call  a  day  cool  when  the  ther- 
mometer is  at  fifty-nine,  and  whether  we  should 
call  it  hot  when  the  thermometer  is  at  sixty-one, 
everybody  admits  that  it  is  hot  when  the  thermom- 
eter  is    at    eighty-five,    and   cold   when    the    ther-  t>u<.  at  aii 

,  .    .  events,  there  is 

mometer  registers  twenty  degrees  of  frost.     In  the  a  certain 
same  way,  though  there  will  be  a  certain  number  of  men°whVre- 
people  who  may  be  classed  as  great  by  one  judge  othlr^fn^bdn 
and   classed    as    ordinary   by   another,    there   is   a  ^°^^  efficient 
certain  number  whose  capacities,  however  unequal  majority. 
amongst   themselves,  set  their  possessors  apart  as 
indubitably  greater  than  the  majority ;  and  we  are 
speaking  with  sufficient,  though  we  cannot  speak 
with  absolute,  precision  when  we  say  that  progress 
depends  on  the  action  of  this  minority. 


ii8  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  II  How  great  the  inequality  is  between  the  natural 

powers  of  men  is  perhaps  most  clearly  evidenced  by 

We  see  this     j-j^g  ^ase  of  art,  and  more  especially  the  art  of  poetry. 

m  poetry,  ^  ^  •"•      ^         •'  *  •' 

In  certain  domains  of  effort  it  may  be  urged  that 
unequal  results  are  caused  by  unequal  circumstances, 
quite  as  much  as  by  unequal  capacities.  But  about 
poetry,  at  all  events,  this  cannot  be  said.  Some  of  the 
greatest  poets  the  world  has  ever  known — it  is  enough 
to  instance  the  cases  of  Burns  and  Shakespeare  — 
have  been  men  of  no  wealth  and  of  very  imperfect 
education.  Obviously,  therefore,  in  poetry  one  man 
has  as  good  a  chance  as  another.  It  is  no  doubt 
often  argued  —  and  this  argument  has  already  been 
examined  —  that  great  poets,  of  whom  Shakespeare  is 
a  favourite  example,  owe  part  of  their  greatness  not  to 
themselves, but  to  their  age.  But  this  does  nothing  to 
explain  the  differences  between  poets  who  belong  to 
the  same  age,  and  who,  all  of  them,  in  this  respect, 
start  with  the  same  advantage.  Let  us  confine  our 
comparisons  then  to  men  who  were  each  other's 
contemporaries,  and  ask  what  made  Burns  a  better 
poet  than  Pye,  Shakespeare  a  greater  poet  than  the 
feeblest  of  his  forgotten  rivals.  Pope  than  Ambrose 
Philips,  Byron  than  ''the  hoarse  Fitzgerald'"? 
There  is  only  one  answer  possible.  These  men 
in  respect  of  poetry  had  been  made  giants  by 
nature;  those  were  condemned  by  nature  to  live 
and  to  die  dwarfs. 

And  the  same  inequality  that  exhibits  itself  in 

the  domain  of  poetry  will  be  found  in  every  other 

in  singers,       domaiu    of    humau    effort.     What    can    be   more 


VARIOUS  KINDS   OF  INEQUALITY  119 

unequal    than    the   gifts    of   different  singers?     In      Book  11 

^  ^  .  .  ^.  Chapter  i 

every  school   and  university  we  see  multitudes  of 
young  men  and  boys  whose  opportunities  of  learn-  in  the  schoiar- 
ing   are    not    only   similar    but    identical,    but    of  the^srnie°^^  ^ 
whom,   in    respect   to    assimilating   what   they  are  ^^^°°^' 
taught,  not  one   in   ten   rises  appreciably  above  a 
certain  level,  and  not  one  in  a  hundred  rises  above 
it   signally.     We   have   Virgil   at  one   end    of   the 
scale,  and  Bavius  and  Maevius  at  the  other ;  at  one 
end  Patti,  and  the  other  the  vocalist  of  the  street ;  at 
one  end  a  Scaliger  and  a  Newton,  and  at  the  other 
the  idler  and  the  dunce,  who  can  hardly  conjugate 
TVTTTOi  or  stumble  across  the  Asses'  Bridge.    And  in 
practical  life  the  same  phenomenon  repeats  itself. 
Let  us  take  any  department  of  social  activity  or  pro- 
duction, on  the  results  of  which  the  welfare  of  society 
at  any  given  time  depends.    Let  us  take,  for  instance,  and  similarly 
the  work  of  government,  or  invention,  or  commercial  liler^^  '^* 
enterprise.     In  each  of  these  we  shall  find  a  large 
number   of   men,   each   doing  what   is   in    him    to 
subserve  some  particular  end ;  and  we  shall  find  a 
few  producing    results  which    are   great   both   for 
themselves   and    others,   and    the   many  producing 
results    which    are    uniform    in     their    individual 
pettiness. 

It  is  perfectly  true  that  in  these  great  depart- 
ments of  practical  life  there  may  not  be  so 
obvious  or  so  widely-extended  an  equality  of 
opportunity  as  that  which  prevails  amongst  poets, 
or  amongst  scholars  in  the  same  seminary,  but  in 
each  department  there  will  be  a  large  number,  at  all 


I20 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  II 
Chapter  i 

Enough  men, 
as  it  is,  have 
equal  op- 
portunities, to 
show  how  un- 
equal men  are 
in  their  powers 
of  using  them. 


No  doubt  a 
man  may  be 
ordinary  in 
one  respect, 
and  great  in 
another ; 


events,  whose  opportunities  are  as  equal  as  human 
ingenuity  could  make  them.  This  is  so  in  the 
French  army,  in  the  English  House  of  Commons, 
and  in  the  world  of  business  and  industry ;  and  yet 
of  men  thus  equally  placed  we  see  some  doing  great 
things,  and  doubling  their  opportunities  by  using 
them ;  others  doing  little  or  nothing,  and  throwing 
their  opportunities  away.  We  have  accordingly  in 
every  domain  of  activity  a  sufficient  number  of 
persons  with  the  same  external  advantages,  to  show 
by  the  extraordinary  difference  between  the  results 
accomplished  by  them  how  great  the  natural 
inequality  between  men's  capacities  is,  and  how  far 
the  efficiency  of  a  few  exceeds  that  of  the  majority. 
It  is  therefore  nothing  to  the  purpose  to  attribute,  as 
many  reformers  do,  men's  inequality  in  efficiency  to 
the  fact  that  equality  of  opportunity  is  not  at 
present  as  general  as  it  theoretically  might  be.  To 
extend  this  equality  further  might  produce  good 
results  or  bad ;  but  in  neither  case  would  it  tend  to 
make  men's  capacities  equal.  The  utmost  it  would 
do  in  this  particular  respect  would  be  merely  to 
widen  the  area  of  their  reahsed  inequality  —  to 
increase  the  number  of  the  mountains,  not  to 
produce  a  plain. 

It  will  doubtless  be  objected  by  those  who  would 
minimise  natural  inequalities  that  a  man  may  be  con- 
temptible in  one  capacity,  that  of  a  poet,  for  instance, 
and  yet  be  greater  as  a  man  than  men  who  in  one 
capacity  are  superior  to  him.  It  may,  for  example, 
be  said  that  Frederick  of    Prussia,  in  spite  of  his 


GREATNESS  TO  BE  MEASURED  BY  RESULTS    121 

bad  poetry,  was  a  greater  man  than  Voltaire.     This      '^ook  11 

r       \  ^,  .        .  ,    .  Chapter  I 

IS  perfectly  true;  but  it  is  necessary  to  explain 
clearly  that  it  in  no  way  contradicts  what  is  being 
here  asserted.  It  is,  on  the  contrary,  part  of  it. 
It  cannot  be  too  emphatically  said  that  greatness, 
in  the  only  sense  in  which  we  are  here  considering 
it  —  that  is  to  say  as  an  agent  of  social  progress  — 
is  a  quality  which  we  attribute  to  a  man  not  with 
reference  to  his  whole  nature,  but  with  reference 
solely  to  the  objective  results  produced  by  him,  so 
that  in  one  domain  of  activity  a  man  may  be  great, 
in  another  ordinary,  in  another  decidedly  stupid. 
What,  then,  we  here  mean  by  a  great  man  is  merely 
a  man  who  is  superior  to  the  majority  in  his  power  but  the 
of  producing  some  given  class  of  result,  whereas  the  ^o^^Zti^ 
average  man  and  the  stupid  are  not  superior  to  the  ^"^' 
majority  in  their  powers  of  producing  any. 

The  reader  must  thus  entirely  disabuse  himself  The  measure 

-,.,,  ...of  a  man's 

of   the  idea  that   greatness,  as  an  agent  of   social  greatness  as 

1  1  1  .  .     an  agent  of 

progress,  has  any  necessary  resemblance  to  great-  sodai  progress 
ness  as  conceived  of  by  the  moralist.     A  man  may '^ '^^  °''"'  ,, 

J  J  results  actually 

be  a  great  saint  or  a  noble  "  moral  character  "  who  produced  by 

...  .  him. 

passes  his  life  in  obscurity,  stretched  on  a  bed  of 
sickness,  and  incapable  even  of  rendering  the 
humblest  help  to  others.  He  is  great  in  virtue 
not  of  what  he  does,  but  of  what  he  is.  But  great- 
ness, as  an  agent  of  social  progress,  has  nothing 
whatever  to  do  with  what  a  man  is,  except  in  so 
far  as  what  he  is  enables  him  to  do  what  he  does. 
If  two  doctors  were  confronted  by  some  terrible 
epidemic,  and  the  one  met  it  by  tending  the  poor 


122 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  II 
Chapter  I 


A  selfish 
doctor,  if 
successful,  is 
greater  than  a 
devoted 
doctor,  if 
unsuccessful. 


Tlie  fact  that 
many  men 
who  produce 
no  social 
results  seem 
better  and 
more  brilliant 
than  many 
men  who  do 
produce  them, 
makes  some 
argue  that 
these  results 
require  no 
greatness  for 
their  produc- 
tion. 


for  nothing,  and  died  in  his  unavaiHng  efforts  to 
save  his  patients,  whilst  the  other  fled  from  the 
infected  district,  and,  solacing  himself  at  a  distance 
with  a  mistress  and  an  excellent  cook,  invented  a 
medicine  by  which  the  disease  could  be  warded  off, 
and  proceeded  to  make  a  large  fortune  by  selling  it, 
though  the  former  as  a  man  might  be  incalculably 
better  than  the  latter,  the  latter  as  an  agent  of 
progress  would  be  incalculably  greater  than  the 
former.  Again,  if  two  doctors  tried  to  invent  such 
a  medicine,  and  whilst  the  first  succeeded  the  second 
failed,  the  second,  though  he  might  have  exerted 
himself  far  more  than  the  first,  and  have  failed  only 
owing  to  some  minute  flaw  in  his  faculties,  would 
be  not  only  less  great  as  an  agent  of  progress  than 
the  first,  but  he  would  not  be  practically  an  agent 
of  progress  at  all,  any  more  than  a  man  is  an 
agent  in  saving  another  from  drowning  if  he 
merely  stretches  a  hand  which  the  drowning  man 
cannot  reach,  and  actually  himself  tumbles  into  the 
water  in  doing  so. 

This  truth,  which  sounds  brutal  when  plainly 
stated,  but  is  really  little  more  than  a  sociological 
truism,  is  constantly  overlooked,  and  even  indig- 
nantly denied,  by  thinkers  whose  emotions  are  more 
powerful  than  their  minds.  The  way  in  which  such 
persons  reason  is  very  easily  understood.  They 
see  that  a  number  of  men  by  whom  great  social 
results  are  produced  —  men  who  make  successful 
inventions  and  who  found  great  businesses  —  are 
narrow-minded,  uncultivated,  and    contemptible    in 


GREATNESS  NOT  AN  ETHICAL    QUALITY    123 
general   conversation,  and  that  a  number  of  other     Book  11 

1  111  11  Chapter! 

men  who  produce  no  such  results  are  scholars, 
critics,  thinkers,  keen  judges  of  men  and  things ;  and 
contrasting  the  brilliancy  of  those  who  have  pro- 
duced no  great  social  results  with  the  narrow  ideas 
and  dulness  of  those  who  have  produced  many, 
they  proceed  to  argue  that  great  social  results  can- 
not possibly  require  great  men  to  produce  them ; 
or,  in  other  words,  that  they  might  be  produced  by 
almost  anybody. 

But   the  whole  of   this   class   of   objections  will  But  the  most 

•^  .         efficient  forms 

altogether  disappear  when  we  more  closely  examme  of  greatness 
what  the  qualities  are  on  which  the  production  of  nothing 
given  social  results  depend.  Let  us  take  a  few™"'^^°"' 
of  these  results  as  examples.  Let  us  take  the 
formulation  and  the  popularising  of  some  particular 
political  demand,  by  which  the  whole  course  of  a 
country's  history  is  affected,  and  the  increasing  and 
cheapening  the  supply  of  some  articles  of  popular 
consumption  —  sugar,  let  us  say,  or  workmen's  boots 
and  clothing.  The  persons  who  urge  the  objections 
we  are  now  discussing  assume  that  all  greatness, 
other  than  physical  strength  and  dexterity,  must  be 
necessarily  ethical  or  intellectual,  and  be  calculated 
to  excite  our  ethical  or  intellectual  admiration.  But 
let  them  consider  the  qualities  requisite  to  produce 
such  results  as  have  just  been  mentioned,  and  they 
will  see  that  no  assumption  could  be  more  wide  of 
the  truth. 

A    man    who   should,    without    underpaying   his 
employees,  succeed  in  manufacturing  for  the  poorer 


124 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  II 
Chapter  i 

A  lofty  im- 
agination is 
often  the 
enemy  to 
practical 
efficiency ; 


classes  boots,  jackets,  or  shirts  better  in  quality 
and  very  much  less  in  price  than  those  which 
they  are  accustomed  to  buy  now,  would  probably 
have  to  devote  a  large  part  of  his  life  to  the 
consideration  of  a  particular  kind  of  seemingly 
sordid  detail.  To  a  man  of  wide  culture  and 
brilliant  imagination,  the  concentration  of  his 
faculties  on  details  such  as  these  would  be  im- 
possible; and  if  he  wished  to  produce  any  of  the 
results  in  question,  he  would  soon  discover  that 
he  could  not.  The  men  who  do  produce  them  are 
rendered  capable  of  doing  so,  not  by  the  width  of 
their  minds,  but  by  the  exceptional  narrowness. 
The  intellectual  stream  flows  strongly  because  it 
is  confined  in  a  narrow  channel,  and  thus  what 
to  the  superficial  observer  seems  a  sign  of  their 
inferiority,  is  really,  so  far  as  the  results  are 
concerned,  one  of  the  chief  causes  of  their 
greatness. 

The  mean  man  with  the  little  thing  to  do 

Sees  it  and  does  it ; 
The  great  man  with  the  great  end  to  pursue 

Dies  ere  he  knows  it. 

Robert  Browning  very  tersely  puts  the  case  thus. 
We  have  only  to  alter  his  language  in  one  respect. 
Seeing  that  the  results  we  have  now  in  view 
are  realised  results  or  nothing,  the  "  mean  man,'' 
as  an  agent  of  material  progress,  will  be  the 
"  great  man,"  and  the  "  great  man "  will  be  the 
little. 

So,   too,  with   regard   to   the   man   who   affects 


GREATNESS   ONLY  PARTLY  INTELLECTUAL    125 

the    history   of    his   country   by   formulating    and     ^°°^  ^^ 

popularising   some   particular   political    demand  — 

the  secret  of  such  a   man's  success,  in  four  cases  and  great 

cfticicncv  is 

out  of  five,  will  be  found  to  lie  in  the  greatness,  not  often  in- 
of  his  intellect,  but  of  his  will  —  in  an  exceptionally  exce^ptionIi° 
sanguine  temperament,  in  exceptional  courage  and  '"'^"^<=*- 
energy,  and  very  likely  in  an  exaggerated  belief  in 
his  own  nostrums,  which,  instead  of  being  a  sign 
of    great    intellectual    acuteness,    is    incompatible 
with  it. 

No  doubt   social    progress,  as    a  whole,  has    re-  intellect « 
quired  and  does  require  for  its  production  intellectual  progress,  ^.^. 
powers  of  the  highest  and  rarest  kind.     The  point '"'""'"''°"  = 
here    insisted    on    is    that    it   is    not   produced    by 
intellectual  powers  alone,  and  that  intellectual  powers 
alone  would  be  quite  unable  to  produce  it.     Thus 
the  sorrows  and  disappointments  of  the  unfortunate 
inventor  are  proverbial ;  and  the  reason  is  that  great 
inventive  powers  are  frequently  accompanied  by  a 
very  feeble  will  and    a  fantastic    ignorance  of   the 
world,  the  inventor,  though  strong  as  a  mind,  being 
pitiably  weak  as  a  man.     He   can   do   everything 
with    his   inventions   except   make  them    useful  to 
anybody.     He  might  be  practically  far  greater  were 
he  to  lose  some  of  his  intellectual  powers,  could  hebutthem- 

...  .      ventor  by  him- 

thereby  develop  some  of  the  humbler  qualities  in  self  is  often 
which  he    is    wanting.     As  it   is,  he    resembles    a  ^p"^* 
chronometer  which  is  without  a  main-spring,  and 
which  is    useless  when    compared  with   a  ten-and- 
sixpenny    watch.       Hence    the     inventor    has    so 
frequently  to  ally  himself  with  the  man  of   enter- 


126  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  II      prise,  and  only  becomes  great,  as  a  social  force,  by 

Chapter  I       \    .  „'',  .  °,  ^^.,  ■' 

doing  so.  buch  unions  are  oiten  sumciently  strange 
and  has  to  in  appcarancc.  We  see  some  man  whose  intellect  is 
with  men  the  fincst  macliinc  imaginable,  but  he  is  only  redeemed 
Tep'tfonaTgifts  from  absolutc  and  grotesque  uselessness  by  his 
are  uninipres-  partner,  who  is  little  better  than  an  inspired  bao:- 

sive,  and  even  Jr  '  r  o 

vulgar.  man.      But   such   a   bagman's   gifts,   however   the 

inefficient  theorist  may  despise  them,  are,  though 
less  striking  than  the  inventor's,  often  quite  as  rare. 
No  doubt  many  great  inventors  have  the  practical 
gifts  as  well  as  the  intellectual,  and  their  greatness, 
in  such  cases,  is  comprehended  completely  in  them- 
selves. It  remains,  however,  an  equally  composite 
thing,  no  matter  whether  it  takes  two  men  or  only 
one  to  complete  it ;  and  exceptional  intellect  is  only 
one  of  its  elements.  The  other  qualities  with  which 
it  requires  to  be  allied,  and  which  alone  give  it  its 
practical  value,  such  as  determination,  shrewdness, 
and  a  certain  thickness  of  skin,  though  often  re- 
markable individually  for  the  exceptional  degree 
to  which  they  are  developed,  just  as  often  unite 
to  produce  practical  greatness,  not  because  of  the 
exceptional  degree  to  which  they  are  developed, 
but  of  the  exceptional  proportions  in  which  they  are 
combined.  Some  of  the  most  essential  of  them, 
indeed,  need  not  be  exceptional  at  all,  except  from 
the  fact  of  their  association  with  others  that  are  so. 
Much  greatness,  for  instance,  of  the  most  powerful 
kind  consists  mainly  of  very  ordinary  sense  in  con- 
junction with  extraordinary  energy ;  and  energy  is 
often,  as  has  already  been  pointed  out,  in  proportion 


GREATNESS  IS  RELATIVE  127 

to  the  narrowness  rather  than  to  the  width  of  the     Book  11 

Chapter  i 

imagination. 

Greatness,  in  short,  as  an  agent  of  social  progress,  Greatness  is 

.      .  ,  ,  .        1  IV        U     i  r        not  one  quality, 

is  in  most  cases  not  a  single  quality,  but  a  peculiar  but  various 
combination  of  many ;  its  composition  varies  o? man"y!^'°"^ 
according  to  the  character  of  the  results  in  the 
production  of  which  the  great  men  are  severally 
more  efficient  than  the  majority ;  and  it  often 
depends  less  on  the  extent  to  which  any  special 
faculty  is  developed,  in  comparison  with  the  same 
faculty  as  possessed  by  ordinary  men,  than  it  does 
on  the  degree  to  which  each  faculty  is  developed  as 
compared  with  the  others  possessed  by  the  great 
man  himself. 

When  we  speak  of  greatness,  then,  in  the  sense  Greatness. 

,  ■"■  *-^  then,  is  merely 

here  attributed   to  the  word  —  when  we   speak  of  those  qualities 

,  r  •    1  1  i  which,  in  any 

great  men  as  agents  of  social  progress  —  we  do  not  domain  of 
mean  that  the  world  is  divided  into  ordinary  men  Kew  morf  ^ 
and  heroes.     The  members  of  that  minority  whom  ^,fficient  than 

-'  the  many. 

we  group  together  as  great  men,  though  some  of 
them  are,  no  doubt,  of  noble  and  heroic  proportions, 
are  for  the  most  part  great  in  relation  to  special 
results  only  ;  even  in  relation  to  these  special  results 
they  are  great  in  very  various  degrees,  and  many 
of  them  in  other  relations  may  be  ordinary, 
or  even  less  than  ordinary.  It  must  therefore  be 
clearly  understood  that  greatness,  as  an  agent  of 
social  progress,  is  not  an  absolute  thing,  and  that  to 
say  of  any  one  man  that  he  possesses  more  great- 
ness than  another  is  a  statement  which,  taken 
by   itself,   has   no   definite    meaning.       When    we 


128  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  II      say   that   a   man    is    s^reat   we    mean    that    he    is 

Chapter  i  -'  .  -    .  . 

exceptionally  efficient  in  producing  some  particular 
result,  which  is  either  implied  or  specified  —  that 
he  is  great  in  commanding  armies,  or  in  manag- 
ing hotels,  or  in  conducting  public  affairs,  or 
in  cheapening  and  improving  the  manufacture  of 
this  or  that  commodity  ;  and  when  we  say  that  such 
and  such  a  man  possesses  the  quality  of  greatness  to 
such  and  such  a  degree  we  mean  that  he  produces 
results  of  a  given  kind,  which  are  in  such  and 
such  a  degree  better  or  more  copious  than  results 
of  the  same  kind  which  are  produced  by  other 
people. 
The  great-man      The  inequality  of  men,  then,  in  natural  capacity 

theory,  then,  .  ...  ,        ,  ,        , 

merely  asserts  bcing   an    obvious   fact,    and    the    nature    and   the 

that  if  some  -y  rj_i''  Tj.'  i*  •l 

men  were  not  dcgrees  ot  their  inequalities  having  been  now 
thaJTmS'^"^  generally  explained,  we  may  re-state,  with  a  meaning 
men,  no  prog-  niorc     prccisc     than   was    formerly    possible,     the 

ress  would  .   .  .,.,., 

take  place  at  fundamental  proposition  implied  in  the  great-man 
theory,  when  that  theory  is  raised  from  a  rhetorical 
to  a  scientific  formula.  Progress  of  an  appreciable 
kind,  in  any  department  of  social  activity  and 
achievement,  takes  place  only  when,  and  in  pro- 
portion as,  some  of  the  men  who  are  working  to 
produce  such  and  such  a  result  are  more  efficient  in 
relation  to  that  class  of  result  than  the  majority  ;  or 
conversely,  if  a  community  contained  no  man  with 
capacities  superior  to  those  possessed  by  the  greater 

But  great  men.  numbcr,  propfrcss  in  that  community  would  be  so 

in  spite  of  i  •       1 1  • 

these  slow  as  to  bc  practically  non-existent. 

1  erences.  ^^    must    now   go    on    to   inquire   what  is   the 


HOW  DOES   GREATNESS   OPERATE  129 

precise  way  in  which  the  men  who  are  superior  to     Book  11 

1  •       .  1     .  1  1  1     11       Chapter  I 

the  majority  brmg  progress  about;  and  we  shall 
find  that  however  various  they  may  be  in  other 
respects,  they  all  promote  progress  in  a  way  that  is  aii  promote 

r         -i  ,11  •       M  progress  in  the 

fundamentally  similar.  same  way. 


CHAPTER   II 

PROGRESS    THE    RESULT    OF    A    STRUGGLE    NOT    FOR 
SURVIVAL,    BUT    FOR    DOMINATION 

It  has  already  been  explained  that  the  great  man, 
as  here  understood,  does  not  in  any  way  correspond 
with  'C^^  fittest  man  in  the  Darwinian  struggle  for 
existence.  The  fittest  man  in  the  Darwinian  sense 
merely  promotes  progress  by  the  physiological  pro- 
cess of  reproducing  his  slight  superiorities  in  his 
children,  and  thus  raising  in  the  slow  course  of  ages 
the  general  level  of  capacity  throughout  subsequent 
generations  of  his  race.  The  great  man,  on  the 
contrary,  promotes  progress,  not  because  he  raises 
the  capacity  of  the  generations  that  come  after  him, 
but  because  he  rises  individually  above  the  general 
level  of  his  own.  This,  however,  is  only  one  of  the 
differences  by  which  the  great  man  is  distinguished 
from  the  fittest.  There  are  two  others,  of  which 
how'thJg^ear  the  first  that  we  must  consider  is  as  follows. 
progress.Tr  ^hc  fittcst  man,  or  the  survivor  in  the  Dar- 
must  consider  winiau  strugglc  for  existence,  is,  so  far  as  his  own 

that  whilst  ^^  '  ^ 

the  fittest  sur-   contemporarics  are  concerned,  greater  than  his  in- 
motes  it         fcriors  only  in  respect  of  what  he  accomplishes  for 


GREA  TNESS  AND  STR  UG  GLE  FOR  EXISTENCE   1 3 1 

himself,  or  for  those  immediately  dependent  on  him.  Book  11 
He  is  the  man  who  lives  and  thrives  whilst  others 
die  or  languish,  because  whilst  they  can  secure  for  by  living 
themselves  but  little  of  what  is  requisite  for  life  and  die/ 
health,  he,  by  his  superior  gifts,  is  able  to  secure 
much.  "■Families'^''  says  Mr.  Spencer,  ''whom  the 
increasing  difficulty  of  odtaining  a  living  does  not 
stimulate  to  improvement  in  production  are  on  the 
high  road  to  extinction^  and  must  ultimately  be 
supplanted  by  those  whom  the  difficulty  does  so 
stimulated  That  is  to  say,  Mr.  Spencer,  and  all 
our  modern  sociologists  with  him,  conceive  of  the 
fittest  as  a  man,  or  a  man  and  his  family,  who  fight 
for  their  food  in  isolation,  like  a  lion  and  lioness 
with  their  cubs,  and  who  affect  their  contempo- 
raries only  by  being  better  fed  than  they,  or  as  a 
race-horse  affects  its  competitors  only  by  being  first 
at  the  winning  post. 

But   the   great   man,  as   an   agent   of   progress,  the  great  man 
shows  his  greatness  in  a  way  precisely  opposite  to  J'esTbyh^e^p-^' 
that  in  which    the  fittest   man  shows   his   fitness.  i"i°'^''''° 
This  it  is  that  our  contemporary  sociologists  all 
fail    to  perceive,  and    endless    error  is   the    conse- 
quence.    The  great  man,  unlike  the  strongest  lion, 
promotes    progress   by  increasing   the  food-supply 
not  of   himself,   but  of   others ;    or  if   he  increase 
his  own,  as  he  no  doubt  generally  does,  he  does  so 
only  by  showing  others  how  to  increase  theirs.     He 
is   like  a  lion  who  should  be  better  fed  than   the 
rest  of  the  lions  in  his  region,  not  because  he  took 
a  carcase  from  them  for  which  they  all  were  fighting, 


live. 


132 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  II 
Chapter  2 


He  promotes 
progress  not 
by  what  he 
does  himself, 
but  by  what 
he  helps  others 
to  do. 


We  can  see 
this  by  con- 
sidering the 
progress  of 
knowledge, 
which,  as  J.  S. 
Mill  says,  is 
the  foundation 
of  all  other 
progress. 


but  because  he  showed  them  how  to  find  others 
which  they  never  would  have  found  unaided,  and 
took  for  himself  in  payment  a  small  portion  of  each. 
The  great  man,  in  fact,  as  an  agent  of  social  prog- 
ress, is  great  not  in  virtue  of  any  completed  results 
which  he  produces  directly,  by  the  action  of  his 
own  hands  or  brains,  or  which  he  exhibits  in  his 
own  person,  but  in  virtue  of  the  completed  results 
which,  by  some  simultaneous  influence  which  he 
exercises  over  the  brains  or  hands  of  others,  he  en- 
ables others  to  exhibit  in  themselves,  or  produce  or 
do  in  the  form  of  products  or  social  services. 

In  order  to  realise  this  great  truth,  let  us  begin 
with  considering  that  form  of  greatness  which  pro- 
motes social  progress  by  supplying  it  with  its  first 
materials,  and  from  which  all  other  kinds  of  great- 
ness draw  some  portion  of  their  nourishment.  It 
so  happens  that  one  of  the  most  remarkable  think- 
ers of  this  century,  who,  though  he  preceded  Mr. 
Spencer,  belongs  to  the  same  school,  is  able  to  as- 
sist us  here  by  a  very  apt  and  remarkable  passage. 

John  Stuart  Mill,  in  that  section  of  his  System  of 
Logic  to  which  he  gives  the  title  of  "  The  Logic  of  the 
Moral  Sciences,'''  writes  thus :  'Ln  the  difficult  process 
of  observation  and  compariso7t  which  is  required 
{for  the  purpose  of  obtaining  a  better  understanding 
of  the  laws  of  empirical  sociology,  and  especially  of 
social  progress)  it  would  evidently  be  a  great  assist- 
a7ice  if  it  should  happen  to  be  the  fact  that  07ie 
element  in  the  complex  existence  of  social  man  is 
pre-eminent  over  all  the  others,  as  the  prime  agent 


KNOWLEDGE   THE  BASIS   OF  PROGRESS    133 
of  the  social  movement.     For  we  could  then  take  the     Book  11 

•^  ,  Chapter  2 

progress  of  that  one  element  as  the  ce^itral  chain, 
to  each  successive  link  of  which,  the  correspondiyig 
links  of  all  the  other  progressioiis  being  appended, 
the  succession  of  facts  would  by  this  alone  be 
presented  in  a  kind  of  spontaneous  order,  far  more 
approachiitg  to  the  real  order  of  their  filiation  than 
could  be  obtained  by  any  other  fnerely  empirical 
process.  Now  the  evidence  of  history  and  that  of 
human  nature  combine,  by  a  striking  instance  of 
consilience,  to  show  that  there  really  is  one  social 
element  which  is  predominant  and  almost  para7nount 
amongst  the  age^tts  of  social  progression.  This  is 
the  state  of  the  speculative  faculties,  including  the 
nature  of  the  beliefs  which  by  any  tneans  they  have 
arrived  at,  concerning  themselves  and  the  world  by 
which  they  are  surrou7ided.  Thus','  Mill  continues, "  to 
take  the  most  obvious  case,  the  impelling  force  to  most 
of  the  improvements  effected  in  the  arts  of  life  is  the 
desire  for  increased  material  comfort;  but  as  we  can 
only  act  on  external  objects  in  proportion  to  our  kiiow- 
ledge  of  them,  the  state  of  knowledge  at  any  given 
time  is  the  limit  of  the  industrial  improvement  pos- 
sible at  that  time,  and  therefore  the  progress  of  in- 
dustry must  follow  and  depend  upon  the  progress  of 
that  knowledge'' 

Any  one  who  was  inclined  to  be  hypercritical 
might  object,  and  object  with  justice,  that  the 
practical  application  of  knowledge  often  lags  be- 
hind the  speculative  attainment,  and  that  material 
progress   therefore,    at   certain   times,  depends   on 


134 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  II 
Chapter  2 


But  all  prog- 
ress in  know- 
ledge is  the 
work  of 
"  decidedly 
exceptional 
individuals," 


some  new  state  of  the  practical  rather  than  of  the 
speculative  faculties ;  but  apart  from  this  not  very 
important  inaccuracy  of  expression,  Mill's  way  of 
putting  the  case  is  admirable  for  its  lucidity  and  for 
its  truth ;  and  we  may,  for  our  present  purpose,  be 
content  to  take  it  as  it  stands.  All  civilisation 
depends  on  the  accumulation  of  speculative  know- 
ledge, and  all  progress  in  civilisation  depends  on 
an  increase  in  speculative  knowledge. 

Speculative  knowledge,  however,  does  not  in- 
crease of  itself.  It  is  not  acquired  without  consider- 
able effort;  and  people  acquire  it  only  because  they 
strongly  desire  to  do  so.  Such  being  the  case,  let 
us  turn  to  another  passage,  taken  likewise  from  the 
writings  of  Mill,  and  occurring  in  the  very  same 
chapter  as  that  which  has  just  been  quoted.  ''It 
would  be  a  great  error,''  says  Mill,  "  and  one  very 
little  likely  to  be  committed^  to  assert  that  speculation, 
intellectual  activity,  the  pursuit  of  truth,  is  amongst 
the  vtore  powerful  prope7tsities  of  human  nature,  or 
holds  a  predominating  place  i7t  the  lives  of  any  save 
decidedly  exceptional  individuals.  But  notwithstand- 
ing the  relative  weakness  of  this  principle  among 
other  sociological  agents,  its  i^ifluence  is  the  main 
determining  cause  of  social  progress,  all  the  other 
dispositions  of  our  nature  which  coittribute  to  that 
progress  being  dependent  on  it  for  accomplishing 
their  share  of  the  work^ 

Now  what  does  this  passage  mean  ?  About  its 
meaning,  and  the  truth  of  its  meaning,  there  can  be 
no  possible  doubt;   but  it  will  be  well  to  observe 


THE    GREAT  MAN  AND  KNOWLEDGE      135 
the  extraordinary  confusion  in  which  Mill  involves     j^ookii 

•'  ^  Chapter  2 

what  he  means  by  his  perverse  manner  of  express- 
ing it.  In  the  first  sentence  of  this  last  passage 
he  tells  us  as  clearly  as  possible  that  with  regard 
to  the  pursuit  of  truth,  and  the  power  of  discoverino^  as  mui  admits, 

.  .  1   .  .     .  ,      though  in 

and  understanding  it,  mankind  are  divided  broadly  cunousiy  con- 
into  two  classes  —  the  great  majority  with  whom  "^^  ^"g"^g«- 
the  ^'■pursuit  of  truth^^  and  ''' intellectual  activity'" 
are  "  slight  propensities^''  and  "  the  decidedly  excep- 
tional iiidividuals''^  with  whom  these  propensities 
are  overmastering.  But  he  has  no  sooner  drawn 
this  clear  and  all-important  distinction  between 
the  two  classes  than  he  proceeds  to  undo  his  own 
work  and  mixes  them  together  again  in  one  un- 
meaning blur.  He  converts  his  statement  that 
only  "  the  decidedly  exceptional  i7tdividuals  "  desire 
truth  with  any  great  intensity,  and  have  the  facul- 
ties requisite  for  discovering  it,  into  the  statement 
that  if  we  take  "  the  decidedly  exceptional  individ- 
uals "  and  the  majority  together,  and  regard  them 
as  one  body,  which  he  calls  "  mankind^'  we  shall 
find  that  the  average  desire  for  truth  is  lukewarm, 
and  the  faculties  for  discovering  it  insufficient. 
He  might  just  as  well  group  Shakespeare  with  a 
hundred  ordinary  men ;  tell  us  that  Shakespeare 
could  write  the  greatest  poetry  the  world  has  ever 
known,  and  that  the  hundred  other  men  could  write 
no  poetry  at  all,  and  then  convert  these  statements 
into  the  following — that  the  one  hundred  and  one 
men,  Shakespeare  included,  could  only  write  poetiy 
of  a  very  moderate  quality. 


136  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  II         This   confusion   of   statement,   however,   on  the 

Chapters  .       ,  .... 

part  of  Mill,  is  merely  mentioned  here  in  passing,  as 
one  more  example  of  the  nature  of  that  inveterate 
error  —  namely  the  ignoring  of  the  differences 
between  one  class  of  men  and  another — which  has 
made  modern  sociology  so  useless  for  practical 
purposes.  The  sole  point  which  really  now  con- 
cerns us  is  this.  In  spite  of  the  verbal,  and  indeed 
the  mental  confusion  into  which  Mill  lapses,  the 
truth  which  he  was  struggling  to  express,  and  which 
no  one,  he  says,  would  be  likely  to  contradict,  is 
not  that,  as  he  nonsensically  puts  it,  the  speculative 
faculties  are  weak  in  mankind  generally,  but  that 
amongst  the  larger  part  of  mankind  they  have 
hardly  any  efficiency  at  all,  whilst  "  in  decidedly 
exceptional  individuals'''  they  are  intense,  active, 
and  conquering ;  and  that  consequently  it  is  these 
"  decidedly  exceptional  individuals  "  who  practically 
constitute  '*  the  one  social  element  which  is  pre- 
dominant, and  almost  paramount,  amongst  the 
agents  of  social  progression'^ 
Now  how  do        Now  such   being   the   case,  let  us   resume   our 

the  exceptional  ,  .  iii  11  -t'ii 

individuals,      prcscnt  inquiry,  and  ask  how  do  these  individuals 

acqdre  kiiow-  who  alonc  strongly  desire  truth,  and  have  the  facul- 

'^?%^sT°^^  ties  for  discovering  it,  perform    the  practical  part 

doing  so?       which  Mill  so  rightly  assigns  to  them?     By  what 

kind  of  conduct  do  they  become  "  agents  of  social 

progression''  so  as  to  raise  communities  from  the 

level  of  helpless  savagery  and  gradually  endow  them 

with  all  the  resources  of  civilisation  ?     One  thing  is 

perfectly  clear.     They  do  not  so  by  the  mere  act 


THE   GREAT  MAN  AS  TEACHER  137 

of  acquiring  knowledge,  by  laying  up  this  treasure  ^^^^^]^ 
in  a  napkin,  or  by  showing  it  secretly  to  one  another. 
They  do  so  only  by  diffusing  it,  in  such  measure  as 
is  practicable,  amongst  a  circle  of  men  much  wider 
than  themselves.  They  do  so,  that  is  to  say,  by 
influencing  the  minds  of  others,  by  guiding  their 
attention  to  this  and  to  that  fact,  by  providing,  as  it 
were,  a  go-cart  for  their  weaker  intellectual  faculties, 
and  compelling  them  to  confront  and  assent  to  such 
and  such  propositions.  All  that  mass  of  developing 
knowledge  and  expanding  ideas  which  forms  not 
only  the  basis  but  a  part  of  all  progressive  civilisa- 
tion, and  is  commonly  called  by  the  general  name 
of  enlightenment,  is  produced  solely  by  the  influence 
on  average  minds  of  the  minds  that  are  "  decidedly 
exceptional^     It  is  not  produced  by  the  fact  that  ^hey promote 

■^  .  .        progress  by 

the  '"''  decidedly  exceptionaV  minds  are  stocked  with  conveying  their 
such  ideas  and  with  such  knowledge  themselves,  and  imposing 
but   by   the  fact   that   they  communicate   such   a  j!jy5-o„°3"' 
measure    of   these    to   average   minds   as   average  °^^^"- 
minds  are  severally  able  to  receive. 

To  realise  the  truth  of  this  we  need  do  no  more 
than  consider  for  a  moment  the  ordinary  process 
of  education.  The  schoolmaster  and  the  college 
tutor,  by  the  State  or  some  other  authority,  are 
compelled  to  give  their  pupils  instruction  in  certain 
subjects.  But  there  is  another  kind  of  compulsion 
involved  in  the  matter  also ;  and  this  has  to  do  not 
with  the  selection  of  the  subjects  that  are  to  be 
taught,  but  with  what  is  to  be  taught  about  them. 
The    general   progress   of    a  community   depends 


i  on, 


138  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  II  primarily  upon  this ;  and  what  is  to  be  taught  about 
them  is  determined  not  by  the  State,  or  by  any 
other  legally  constituted  body,  but  by  the  masters 
of  speculative  knowledge,  by  contemporary  men 
of  science,  scholars,  historians,  and  philosophers. 
Knowledge  advances  because  these  men  are  not 
only  adding  to  it,  but  because  they  are  perpetually 
assimilating  the  new  discoveries  with  the  old ;  and 
these  men,  by  means  of  their  comments  on  previous 
writers,  or  by  new  works  of  their  own,  often  repro- 
duced in  the  form  of  text-books,  put  the  word  into 
the  teachers'  mouths;  and  the  teachers,  like  the 
prophet  Balaam,  are  compelled  to  speak  it.  In 
other  words,  great  speculative  thinkers  are  great 
as  agents  of  mental  civilisation  and  enlightenment 
only  because,  and  only  in  so  far  as,  they  settle  for 
others  what  these  others  shall  believe  and  think. 
A  similar  thing      And  now  Ict  US  pass  from  mental  progress   to 

is  true  of  in-  ,  ^  i       •         i  i      i 

vention,  which  material — that  IS  to  say,  from  speculative  knowledge 
applied/  ^^  to  applied  knowledge;  and  the  truth  that  is  being  here 
insisted  on  will  become  clearer  still.  The  master  of 
knowledge,  as  applied  to  production,  is  the  inventor. 
Now  the  most  perfect  and  important  machines  ever 
devised  by  man — let  us  say  the  steam-engine  and 
the  printing  press  —  had  they  been  planned  by  their 
original  inventors  in  all  their  present  completeness, 
but  kept  by  the  inventors  to  themselves  in  the 
form  of  working  models,  made  by  their  own  hands 
and  shut  up  in  their  own  rooms,  would  have  left 
the  arts  of  life  totally  unaffected ;  our  fastest 
means  of  travelling  would  still  be  the  stage-coach; 


THE  INVENTOR  AND  APPLIED  KNOWLEDGE    139 

our  few  books  would  be  produced  by  the  methods  (^^^'''jj/^ 
of  the  medioeval  scriptorium.  These  machines  are 
instruments  of  social  progress  only  because,  and  in 
so  far  as,  they  are  multiplied  and  brought  into  use ; 
and  they  could  not  be  multiplied — as  efficient  im- 
plements, they  could  not  be  even  made — without 
the  co-operation  of  an  enormous  number  of  workers. 
It  is  probable  indeed  that  in  constructing  the  very 
model  itself  an  inventor  will  have  to  employ 
some  labour  besides  his  own.     Thus  this  first  and  invention  pro- 

motes  progress 

preliminary  step  towards  rendering  his  apparatus  a  only  because 

-  .  .    ,  1  i     1  1         1        *he  inventor 

factor  m  social  progress  he  can  take  only  by  influences  the 
influencing  one  or  two  other  men,  at  all  events  —  to^Jmen  Ito 
artisans  whose  technical  action  he  directs  in  such  "^^ke  and  use 

his  machines. 

a  way  that  it  produces  something  specifically 
different  from  anything  which  it  had  produced 
before ;  and  as  the  apparatus  is  reproduced  on  a 
larger  scale,  put  on  the  market,  multiplied  so  as  to 
meet  a  growing  demand,  and  thus  actually  produces 
an  effect  on  the  arts  of  life,  this  practical  result 
takes  place  only  because,  and  in  so  far  as,  the 
number  of  artisans  whose  action  is  influenced  by 
the  inventor  increases.  The  inventor,  in  other 
words,  is  an  agent  of  "  social  progression "  only 
because  the  particularised  knowledge  of  which  his 
invention  consists  is  embodied  either  in  models,  or 
drawings,  or  written  or  spoken  orders,  and  thus 
affects  the  technical  action  of  whole  classes  of  other 
men,  just  as  Mr.  Spencer  affects,  by  means  of  his 
manuscript,  the  technical  actions  of  the  compositors 
who  put  his  treatises  into  type. 


are  supplied. 


140  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  II  Material    progress,   however,   depends   not   only 

on  the  inventor  and  his  machine.  It  depends 
also  on  the  uses  to  which  his  machine  is  to  be 
put.  Here  we  shall  find  a  new  kind  of  greatness  to 
be  necessary  —  that  which  is  called  business  ability; 
and  we  shall  find  that  this  operates  precisely  like 
the  greatness  of  the  inventor,  through  the  influence 
which  its  possession  exercises  over  other  men. 
The  man  of         js^\\  prosfress  or  development  in  commerce  and 

business  ability  ^  x        o  ... 

promotes  prog- in  thc  arts  of  production  is  in  proportion   to  the 

ress  also  only  ,  .  ,  .  c     ,a 

by  so  ordering  correspondencc  in  every  place  and  season  or  the 
pl-ecisVwan?s''  g^o^s  brought  Into  the  market  with  the  contem- 
of  the  public    porary  wants   of   the    buyers.     If   it  were  not  for 

are  sunnlied.       x  y  j 

this  correspondence  of  the  economic  supply  with  the 
demand,  progress  in  production  would  not  be  social 
progress  at  all ;  for  just  as  a  community  does  not 
become  materially  civilised  by  the  mere  act  of 
wanting  what  it  cannot  get,  so  it  does  not  become 
materially  civilised  by  being  presented  with  what 
it  does  not  want  —  clothes,  for  example,  which  it 
could  not  possibly  wear,  and  books  in  an  unknown 
language,  which  it  could  not  possibly  read,  or 
diminutive  houses  and  furniture  fit  only  for  dolls. 
Now  in  any  progressive  community  the  wants  of 
the  buyers  are  in  constant  process  not  only  of 
development  but  fluctuation,  and  are  rarely  quite 
the  same  in  any  two  localities  simultaneously.  In 
order,  therefore,  that  what  is  supplied  may  be  in 
correspondence  with  what  is  wanted,  it  is  necessary 
that  in  each  industry  the  nature  of  the  commodities 
produced  be  continually  modified   by  men  with  a 


THE  GREAT  MAN'S  INFLUENCE  ON  OTHERS  141 
special  sort  of  knowledge  of  the  world ;  and  also,      ^°°^  ^^ 

r  .  ^-      „    .  ,  Chapter  a 

since  want,  in  the  sense  of  efncient  demand,  depends 
on  the  price  at  which  these  commodities  can  be 
supplied,  it  is  necessary,  just  as  it  is  in  the  case 
of  the  manufacture  of  machinery,  that  the  army  of 
men  whose  labour  is  involved  in  producing  them 
shall  be  subject  to  men  who,  by  their  powers  of 
industrial  generalship,  will  be  able  to  reduce  the 
cost  of  reproduction  to  a  minimum.  Every  business, 
in  fact,  and  every  industrial  enterprise,  succeeds  or 
fails,  not  according  to  the  amount  of  average  labour 
involved  in  it,  but  according  to  the  talents  and 
energy  by  which  this  labour  is  directed.  Thus 
in  the  economic  domain,  even  more  than  in  the 
intellectual,  the  great  man  is  seen  to  be  an 
agent  of  "■  social progressio^i'''  in  virtue  not  of  the 
results  which  he  himself  produces  by  the  direct 
action  of  his  own  hands  or  brain,  but  of  the 
results  which,  being  what  he  is,  he  causes  to  be 
produced  by  others. 

And  now  having  dealt  with  the  great  man  as  an  And  the  same 

r  1       •  1   '1  -RTMi  principle  is 

agent  or  speculative  progress,  which,  as  Mill  says,  obviously  true 
is  at  the  bottom  of  progress  of  all  other  kinds,  and  JJIvar.pScs^ 
having  dealt  with   him   also  as   an    agent   of  that  ^^^  "hgion. 
manufacturing,  commercial,   economic,   or  material 
progress   which    Mill    cites   as    the   chief    example 
of  what   practical   progress   is,   and   having  shown 
how   the    essence    of    his    greatness   is    his   power 
of   influencing   others,  let   us    illustrate   this    truth 
finally  by  a  brief   reference  to  three    other   kinds 
of    human    and    social    activity   which    exhibit    it 


142  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  II     in  a  Hgrht  so  obvious  that  it  requires  no  explana- 

Chapter2         .  ^  .  .    .  ,  .  . 

tion.  These  three  kinds  of  activity  are  the  military, 
the  political,  and  the  religious.  The  great  soldier, 
as  has  been  said  already,  is  essentially  the  great 
commander  —  the  man  who  makes  others  act  and 
group  themselves  in  a  specific  way.  The  statesman 
not  only  aims  at  benefiting  his  countrymen  gener- 
ally, but  he  achieves  his  aim  by  the  same  means 
as  the  soldier,  namely,  by  influencing  the  actions  of 
others  in  certain  specific  respects ;  whilst  the  man 
who  is  socially  great  in  the  domain  of  morals  and 
religion  is  the  man  whose  teaching  and  example 
affect  the  actions,  and  even  the  inmost  feelings,  of 
multitudes,  or  gives  precision  to  their  faith. 

But  here,  having  reduced  to  a  truism  this  impor- 
tant truth  that  the  great  man,  as  an  agent .  of  social 
progress,  is  great  only  because  he  is  able  to  exercise 
Greatness,       a  spccific  iiifluencc  ovcr  others,  it  is  necessary  to 

however,  is  not  .  , . «-  ,  -    -  , 

in  all  cases  tum  our  attention  to  a  dirierent  order  oi  tacts  alto- 
ficiat"^  *^^"^'  gether.  Greatness,  as  we  have  seen  already,  is  of 
very  many  kinds.  It  is  a  varying  compound  of 
various  and  variously  developed  qualities ;  and 
its  degree  is  measured  by  its  efiiciency  in  pro- 
ducing this  or  that  result  by  which  society  is 
benefited.  But  greatness,  in  the  sense  of  excep- 
tional power  of  so  influencing  others  that  some 
given  result  shall  be  produced  by  them,  has  other 
varieties  besides  those  that  have  been  already  men- 
tioned. Each  domain  of  progress  has  not  only  its 
own  leaders,  but  it  has  leaders  who  desire  to  lead 
men  in  very  different  directions.    There  are  scientists 


THE  STRUGGLE  BETWEEN  GREAT  MEN     143 
with  conflictino;  theories,  inventors  with  rival  inven-     ^^o^*  ^^ 

.  1  .       1  ,.    .  T        r    11  Chapter  2 

tions,   statesmen    with    rival    policies.      It   follows 
accordinsfly  that  though  all  these  men  may  be  pos- The  influence 

,       -        ,  .      ,     p     .      ,         ,  ,  ,  of  some  great 

sessed  of  talents  indennitely  above  the  average,  they  men  is  more 
would  not  all  of  them,  were  their  influence  over  other  uia'^S^of"^ 
men  equal,  affect  society  in  an  equally  advantageous  °'^^''^- 
way.     Some  men,  indeed,  whose  talents  are  ""decid- 
edly exceptional  would,  on  account  of  some  flaw  or 
defect  in  their  character,  not  promote,  but,  on  the 
contrary,  retard  true  progress,  in  exact  proportion 
as  they  made  their  views  prevail.     Thus,  though  all 
progress  is  due  to  great  men,  all  great  men  would 
not  promote  progress ;  or  they  would,  at  all  events, 
not   promote    it    equally.      Progress,    therefore,    as  Progress,  then. 

involves  & 

resulting  from  the  actions  of  great  men,  depends  on  struggle 
the  degree  to  which  certain  of  them  make  their  own  Jhrfitfesr^eat 
views  prevail,  and   secure  the  rejection  of   others  '"^"  ^^.^" 

*■  ^  ^        ^  •'  secure  mflu- 

which   are  directly  or  indirectly  opposed  to  them,  ence  over 

-        ,  ,  ,  .  .  .    .        others,  and 

It  depends,  that  is  to  say,  on  a  keen  competitive  destroy  the  in- 
struggle  which  is  continually  taking  place  within  the  less  fit!  °^  *^^ 
limits  of  the  exceptional  minority. 

And    here   we    come    to    that   further    point   Qi^^-^o^<^omQ 

'■  ,  to  another 

difference,    which     still     remains    to    be    noticed,  point  of  differ- 

encc  between 

between  the  part  played  in  social  progress  by  the  fittest  great 
the  great  man,  and  the  part  in  it  played  by  the  fiti'st^survi'vor. 
fittest  according  to  the  Darwinian  theory.  Two 
points  of  difference  between  them  have  been  noted 
and  explained  already,  one  being  that  the  fittest 
man  promotes  progress  only  because  he  raises,  by  a 
physiological  process,  the  average  capacities  of  his 
successors,  whereas  the  great  man  promotes  prog- 


144  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  II     ress  because  he  is  himself  more  capable  than  his 

Chapter  2  .  1  1  i      •  1  1  r 

contemporaries ;    the   other   being   that    the  fittest 

fulfils  his  social  function  by  fighting  for  his  own  hand, 

without  any  reference  to  others,  whereas  the  great 

man  fulfils  his  solely  by  influencing  others.     We  are 

now  coming  to  a  third  point,  which  is,  for  practical 

purposes,  even  more  important  than  the  preceding. 

The   great-man    theory,  just   like   the    theory  of 

Darwin,   involves    a    competitive    struggle.      This 

struggle  is  a  struggle  between  great  men ;  and  its 

existence  is  a  fact  of   too  obvious  a  character  to 

have  escaped  the  notice  of  even  the  most  inaccurate 

of  our  social  evolutionists.     But  they  one  and  all 

The  social       of  them  havc  completely  misunderstood  its  nature. 

t^hTDanvlnian  They  havc   hastcucd  to  identify  it  with   the   Dar- 

sSS  [rto    winian  struggle  for  existence,  from  which  it  differs 

be  found  in      \^  ^hc  most  vital  manner  conceivable ;  and,  obscur- 

the  struggle  of    ,  ,  .  .  ,  , 

labourers  to  ing  it  thus  by  a  loose  and  misleading  analogy,  they 
^n^^empoy-  Yi2i\Q.  managed  to  blind  themselves  to  its  entire 
practical  significance.  The  Darwinian  struggle  for 
existence  no  doubt  has  its  counterpart  in  the  con- 
temporary competition  of  labourers  to  find  remunera- 
tive employment,  and  in  the  fact  that  those  who  are 
least  successful  in  finding  it  would,  if  left  to  them- 
selves, be  continually  dying  off.  In  a  progressive 
country  there  is,  or  there  always  tends  to  be,  a 
larger  number  of  would-be  labourers  than  there  is  of 
tasks  which  at  the  moment  can  be  profitably  assigned 
to  them.  A  struggle  therefore  is  involved  in  obtain- 
ing work  of  any  kind ;  and  for  the  higher  kinds  of 
work  the  struggle  is  very  keen.     But  this  is  not  the 


DEXTERITY  NOT  PROGRESSIVE  145 

struggle  to  which  modern  progress  is  due.  Prog-  (P°°''" 
ress,  in  the  sense  of  the  rapid  and  appreciable 
movement  which  alone  concerns  us  here,  is  —  to 
confine  ourselves  for  a  moment  to  the  domain  of 
industry  —  not  the  result  of  a  struggle  to  execute 
work  in  the  best  way,  but  is  the  result  of  a  struggle 
to  give  the  best  orders  for  its  execution.  It  pre- 
supposes the  existence  of  a  certain  amount  of  skill ; 
but  it  does  not,  except  in  its  very  earliest  stages, 
depend  on  the  struggle  of  so  many  thousand  men, 
each  to  become  individually  a  more  skilful  worker 
than  his  fellows.  It  is,  on  the  contrary,  when  its 
earliest  stasres  have  been  passed,  so  independent  of  ^"*  '^'^  '^  "ot 

° ,  .....  ths  struggle 

any  further  increase  of  skill  in  the  individual  worker,  to  which  his- 

,  .  .  .,  1   "1    i        1   '11  •         torical  progress 

that    it   contmues    its  course  whilst  skill   remains  is  due; 
stationary. 

This  is  shown  by  the  fact  that  some  of  the  greatest 
advances    ever  made    in  material    civilisation  have 
been  made  during  the  active  lifetime,  and  with  the 
aid  of  the  hands  and  muscles,  of  a  single  generation  for  the  most 
of  workers,  and  has  implied  no  improvement  at  all  has  taken  place 
either  in  their  acquired  faculties  or  their  inherited.  SlJ,'crra"sed"fit- 
Let  us  take,  for  instance,  the  introduction  of  the  j""oJ"els! 
electric  light,  and  the  way  in  which  it  is  superseding 
gas.     The  mechanics  first  employed  to  make  the 
appliances  for  its  production  were   none   of  them 
asked  to  perform  any  task  which  required  on  their 
part  any  new  knowledge  or  dexterity.    All  they  were 
asked  to  do,  and  all  they  did,  was  to  submit  their 
existing  faculties  to  some  new  external  guidance: 
and  the  electric  light,  in  so  far  as  it  has  superseded 


146  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  II     gas,  has  superseded  it  not  because  it  is  the  product 

of  more  skilful  labour,  but  because  it  is  the  product 

The  progres-    of  manual  labour  directed  by  a  set  of  inventors  and 

sive  struggle  i  ^    •  •    i 

in  industry  is    employcrs,  who,  SO  far  as  regards  certain  social  re- 
tirdvTo  the'     quirements,  direct  it  more  successfully  than  another 
employers;      ^^^^     jj^^  strugglc  which  it  rcprcseuts  is  a  struggle 
between   employers  only.     It  does   not,  except  by 
accident,  represent  any  struggle  between  the  em- 
ployed. 

And  what  is  true  of  the  struggle  which  produces 
and  in  every  industrial  progrcss,  is  true  of  that  which  produces 
progress  it      progrcss  of  all  othcr  kinds.     Scientific  knowledge 

is  confined  to      .  .  ,•  .t  i."  i      •     j* 

the  leaders,  incrcascs  lu  proportiou  as  those  exceptional  indi- 
ciusionofthose  viduals  whosc  studics  have  brought  them  most  near 
who  are  led.  to  tlic  truth  arc  able  to  fight  down  the  opinions  of 
the  exceptional  individuals  who  differ  from  them, 
and  to  impress  their  own  undisputed  upon  the  world. 
Such  knowledge  does  not  increase  on  account  of 
any  struggle  amongst  the  learners,  which  causes  some 
of  them  to  become  more  and  more  apt  in  learning. 
It  grows  on  account  of  a  struggle  between  philos- 
ophers, each  of  whom  aims  at  settling  what  the 
learners  shall  learn.  And  with  regard  to  religion 
and  politics  the  case  is  just  the  same.  The  pro- 
gressive struggle  is  primarily  between  rival  prophets 
and  politicians.  The  spread  of  Christianity,  for 
instance,  was  not  brought  about  by  Christian  races 
exterminating  those  that  were  not  Christians.  It 
was  brought  about  by  Christian  thinkers  and  teachers 
discrediting  the  doctrines  taught  by  thinkers  and 
teachers  who  were  opposed  to  them.     Free-trade, 


LIMITS   OF  THE  PROGRESSIVE  STRUGGLE     147 
aojain,  in  this  country  has  not  triumphed  over  pro-     Book  11 

.         .        •  1  1  c     r  n  ,  Chapter  2 

tectionism,  because  the  mass  of  free-traders  have 
exterminated  the  mass  of  protectionists.  It  has 
triumphed  simply  because,  in  the  eyes  of  the 
majority,  one  school  of  theorists  has  succeeded  in 
discrediting  another. 

Now  these  facts,  which,  when  once  stated,  are  so  i"  t^e  pro- 
obvious,  not  only  throw  the  Darwinian  struggle  for  struggle 
existence   altogether   into    the    background    as    an  me'n.X  m?ss 
asrent  in  social  proo;ress,  but  they  show  that  it  pre-  °^  *^^    . 

o  ^  X        o  '  -'  1  community 

sents  US  with  no  true  analoo-y  to  that  kind  of  strussrle  p'^y  no  pan 

.        .  whatever. 

from  which  progress  principally  results.  They 
show  us,  on  the  contrary,  that  the  struggle  which 
produces  social  progress,  though  it  resembles  the 
Darwinian  struggle  in  one  point,  is  in  all  other  points 
contrasted  with  it.  The  struggle  of  one  employer 
against  another  to  direct  labour  in  the  most  ad- 
vantageous way,  or  the  struggle  of  one  politician  or 
religious  teacher  against  another  to  secure  for  his 
own  views  the  largest  number  of  adherents,  is  so 
far  like  the  Darwinian  struggle  for  existence,  that  it 
is  a  struggle  in  which  individual  is  pitted  against 
individual,  and  the  gain  of  the  successful  is  the  loss 
of  the  unsuccessful.  But  the  limits  within  which 
this  struggle  is  confined  are  very  narrow  indeed ; 
and  the  mass  of  the  community  takes  no  part  in  it 
whatsoever. 

In  order  to  show  this  with  the  utmost  clearness 
possible,  let  us  turn  again  to  the  domain  of  economic 
progress,  which  generally  supplies  the  sociologist 
with  his  simplest  and  most  luminous  illustrations. 


148  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  II     The  success  of  the  strongest  and  ablest  employers  — 

that   is  to  say,  the  heads  of    the  most   successful 

Let  us  take,     busincsscs  —  may  involve,  and   does  involve,  their 

for  instance,  ,  .  i     i  •  i 

two  rival  hotel-  sclcction  for  survival  as  employers,  and  does  involve 
eepers.  ^^^  extinction,  as  employers,  though  not  necessarily 
as  men  and  parents,  of  their  weaker  and  less  able 
rivals ;  but  it  involves  no  struggle  for  existence  with 
the  men  employed  by  them  —  that  is  to  say,  with  the 
great  masses  of  the  community.  Two  men,  we  will 
say,  start  rival  hotels,  and  each  begins  with  a  staff 
of  a  hundred  persons.     One  of  the  two  understands 

One  becomes   ^jg  busiucss  far  better  than  the  other.     His  hotel  is 

bankrupt,  and 

the  other  takes  always  full,  whilst  his  rival's  is  half  empty.      The 
and'hi^staff!    latter  at  last  becomes  bankrupt ;  the  former  buys  his 
business,  and  together  with  his  premises  takes  over 
his  staff.     He  employs  two  hundred  persons,  instead 
of  a  hundred  as  at  first ;  the  hotel  of  the  bankrupt, 
which  the  bankrupt  ran  at  a  loss,  now  yields  the 
same  profit  as  the  other ;  and  the  aggregate  takings 
of  the  two  are  thus  increased  largely.      Here  we 
have  a  community  of  two  hundred  and  two  persons 
offering  a  marked  example  of  great  material  progress ; 
and  this  progress  has  been  the  result  of  a  genuine 
struggle  for  existence.     But  the  struggle  for  exist- 
ence has  been  between  two  persons  only  —  that  is  to 
say,    between    the    two    hotel-keepers.     As    koiel- 
Thesoie         keepcvs  existcncc  is  the  very  thing  they  have  been 
between  the     Struggling  for,  and  the  survival  of  the  one  has  meant 
th^^empioyedL  the  disappearance  of  the  other ;  but  between  them 
and  the  two  hundred  persons  employed    by   them 
there  has  been  no  struggle  at  all.     The  achievement 


THE  RIVALRY  OF  EMPLOYERS  149 

by  the  successful  hotel-keeper  of  a  fortune  double     ^°°^ " 

^  ^  ,  Chapter  2 

that  with  which  he  started   has  not  involved  any 
diminution  in  the  wages  of  his  staff.     It  will,  on  the  The  staff  of 

.  .         the  unsuccess- 

contrary,  if  we  are  to  take  the  case  now  in  question  fuihotei-keeper 
as  typical  of  the  survival  of  the  fittest  employers  ly'bdng  em-' 
generally,  have  not  only  not  diminished  their  wages,  ju^gsshiV^'^ 
but  very  largely  increased  them.  For  here  there 
is  one  further  truth  which  naturally  introduces 
itself  to  our  observation.  Whatever  allowance  it 
may  be  necessary  to  make  for  the  lowest  class  or 
residuum  of  our  modern  populations,  it  is  the  most 
clearly  proved  and  prominent  fact  in  modern  indus- 
trial history  —  and  one  which  even  socialists  are 
now  ceasing  to  deny  —  that  along  with  the  vast  in- 
crease in  wealth  which  the  ablest  employers  have, 
by  their  struggle  with  rivals,  secured  for  their  own 
enjoyment,  there  has  been  not  a  corresponding 
diminution,  but  a  corresponding  increase  in  the 
means  of  subsistence  that  have  gone  to  the  popu- 
lation generally.  The  average  income  per  head  in 
this  country  of  that  class  —  composed  mainly  of 
wage-earners  —  which  does  not  pay  income  tax  has, 
in  terms  of  money,  nearly  trebled  itself  during  the 
present  century;  its  purchasing  power  has  increased 
in  a  yet  larger  ratio,  and  its  increase  will  be  found 
to  have  been  most  rapid  and  striking  at  periods 
when  the  struggle  amongst  the  employing  class  has 
been  keenest. 

It  will  thus  be  seen  that  the  strusfele  which  pro-  Historical 

progress,  then, 

duces  economic  progress  —  and  progress  of  every  results  from  a 
kind  is  produced  in  the  same  way — is  not  a  general  ^"""^^^ 


I50  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  II     struggle  which  pervades  the  community  as  a  whole ; 

neither  is  it  a  struggle  between  the  majority  and  an 

not  for  sub-     exceptionally  able  minority,  in  which  both  classes 

sistence,  but  ...  .  .  ,    . 

for  domination,  are  strugglmg  lor  what  only  one  can  wm,  and  in 
which  the  gain  of  the  one  involves  the  loss  of  the 
other;  but  it  is  a  struggle  which  is  confined  to 
the  members  of  the  minority  alone,  and  in  which 
the  majority  play  no  part  as  antagonists  whatsoever. 
It  is  not  a  struggle  amongst  the  community  gener- 
ally to  live,  but  a  struggle  amongst  a  small  section 
of  the  community  to  lead,  to  direct,  to  employ,  the 
majority  in  the  best  way;  and  this  struggle  is  an 
agent  of  progress  because  it  tends  to  result,  not  in 
the  survival  of  the  fittest  man,  but  in  the  domina- 
tion of  the  greatest  man. 


CHAPTER   III 

THE   MEANS    BY    WHICH    THE    GREAT    MAN    APPLIES 
HIS    GREATNESS    TO    WEALTH-PRODUCTION 

The  whole    secret   of   social   progress,  other  than 
the  most  rudimentary,  is  summed  up  in  the  formula 
with  which  the  preceding   chapter  has  concluded. 
Progress  is   the    result   of   the   domination    or  the 
triumphant  influence   of   the  greatest.     That  is  to  aii  gain  by  the 
say,  the  civilisation   of   the   entire   community  de- the  fittest. 
pends  alike  for   its    advance    and  for   its  mainten-  wh'^o  flifto^'''^ 
ance  on  a  strus^Qrle  which    is   confined  within  the  f^"!"^  p^*,^"" 

"-''-'_  ioi  themselves. 

limits  of  an  exceptional  class ;  and  the  ordinary 
members  of  the  community  are  connected  with  it 
only  by  the  fact  that  when  the  fittest  competitor 
achieves  the  domination  for  which  he  is  struggling, 
they,  instead  of  being  defeated  by  him,  share  the 
advantage  of  his  victory.  When  the  scientific  doctor 
discredits  the  theories  of  the  quack,  when  the  com- 
petent organiser  of  industry  causes  the  ruin  of  the 
incompetent,  when  a  good  ministry  drives  a  bad 
from  office,  when  a  great  general  supersedes  one 
who  is  inferior,  or  when  a  true  religious  teacher 
destroys  the  influence  of  a  false,  the  whole  commu- 
nity gains,  except  the  men  who  have  personally  lost 

151 


152 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  II 
Chapter  3 


We  must  con- 
sider, however, 
that  the  great 
men  who 
struggle  for 
domination 
would  not  do 
so  without 
some  strong 
motive ; 


authority,  and  who  share  the  merited  fate  of  their 
own  errors  or  deficiencies. 

The  progress  and  the  maintenance,  then,  of 
civihsation  in  any  community  depends  on  its  possess- 
ing a  number  of  great  men,  of  which  number  the 
greatest  shall,  by  competition  with  the  others, 
succeed  in  gaining  a  control  over  the  beliefs  and 
actions  of  the  majority. 

Here,  however,  we  are  introduced  to  two  new 
sets  of  facts,  which  have  not  thus  far  come  under 
our  consideration  at  all. 

In  the  first  place,  great  men  do  not  come  into 
the  world  ready-made.  Their  greatness  is  potential 
only,  or  in  other  words  it  is  practically  non-existent, 
until  it  has  been  developed  ;  and  the  process  of 
developing  it  is  in  most  cases  extremely  arduous. 
The  philosopher,  the  soldier,  the  inventor,  the  states- 
man, the  great  merchant  or  manufacturer,  achieve 
success  only  by  prolonged  and  intense  effort,  by 
study,  by  concentrated  thought,  by  action,  by 
rude  experience.  Genius,  indeed,  has  been  defined 
as  an  infinite  capacity  for  taking  trouble ;  and  the 
definition,  though  very  incomplete,  is,  so  far  as  it 
goes,  true.  No  one,  however,  takes  trouble  with- 
out a  motive ;  and  a  motive  being  some  object  of 
desire,  such  as  money,  rank,  or  pleasure,  which  a 
man  hopes  to  attain  by  a  certain  line  of  action,  it 
follows  that  if  a  community  is  to  possess  great  men 
as  actual  agents  of  progress,  and  not  merely  as  wasted 
potentialities,  its  social  constitution  must  be  such  as 
to  offer  and  make  attainable  positions,  possessions. 


MEANS  OF  THE  GREAT  MAN'S  INFLUENCE     153 

pleasures,  or  other  advantages  which  its  potentially     ^0°''  '^^ 
great  men  will  feel  to  be  worth  working  for. 

In  the  second  place,  since  the  great  man,  as  we  •'»nd  also  that 

-  .  -  ,..,..  they  cannot 

have  seen,  is  an  agent  01  progress  and  civilisation  dominate 
only  because  he  influences  others — because  he  guides  by  TomTpl?- 
their   speculative    beliefs,   and    in   certain    respects  *''^"'^''  '"^^"s- 
commands  their  actions  —  the  society  or  community 
to  which  the  great  man  belongs  must  be  such  as  not 
only  to  supply  him  with  a  motive  for  exercising  this 
influence,  but  also  to  enable  him  to  secure  for  him- 
self the  means  by  which  it  may  be  exercised ;  and, 
furthermore,  the  means  in  question  must  be  of  a 
kind  which  will  enable  the  rival  great  men  to  bring 
their  respective  capacities  to  a  decisive   practical 
test,  so  that  the  influence  of  the  most  efflcient  may 
establish  itself,  and  that  of  the  less  efficient  cease. 

Now  the  whole  question  of  motive  we  will  deal  Now  the  ques- 

•11      r  1  •     tion  o^  motive 

with   later   on.     We   will   for   the   present   put   it  we  win  treat 
altogether  aside.    We  will  assume  a  natural  impulse  It  present^we 
on  the  part  of  all  great  men  to  develop  their  powers  ourseuS'to 
to   the    utmost,   and    employ  them   in    influencins^  the  question  of 

•'  ^  means. 

others,  wholly  independent  of  any  other  reward 
than  such  a  minimum  of  sustenance  and  comfort  as  is 
physically  essential  to  their  efficiency ;  and  we  will 
confine  our  attention  altogether  to  the  question  of 
the  means  by  which  the  influence  of  the  great  men 
over  the  majority  is  obtained. 

Human  progress,  however,  being  a  complex  thing,  These  vary  in 
and  taking  place  in  different  domains  of   activity,  of  social 
the  means  by  which  the  great  man  influences  others  ^^'""^y- 
will  vary  with  the  nature  of  the  results  which  his 


cussion. 


154  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  II     influence  aims  at  elicitinor.     The  social  activities  on 

Chapters  .  111 

which  progress  depends,  though  they  may  be  sub- 
divided indefinitely,  are  reducible  to  five  kinds  — 
intellectual,  religious,  military,  economic,  and  politi- 
cal ;  and  with  regard  to  the  two  first,  the  influence 
of  the  great  man  exerts  itself  to  determine  what 
others  shall  believe  and  think;  with  regard  to 
the  three  last,  it  exerts  itself  to  determine  what 
others  shall  do. 
In  some  they        Now  out  of  thcse  fivc  domains  of  activity  the 

are  too  obvious  ii-ii  ^^     • 

toneeddis-  thrcc  first — namely,  the  intellectual,  the  religious, 
and  the  militaiy  —  are  such  that  the  means  by 
which  the  great  man  makes  his  influence  felt  in 
them  hardly  require  discussion.  In  the  first  place, 
they  are  obvious  —  there  is  no  dispute  about  what 
they  are ;  and,  in  the  second  place,  the  fact  of  their 
being  what  they  are  has  no  bearing,  except  such  as 
is  very  remote,  on  any  disputed  question  concerning 
the  practical  organisation  of  society.  In  the  in- 
tellectual world  thinkers,  scholars,  and  men  of  science 
gain  their  influence  by  discussions,  for  the  most  part 
embodied  in  books,  which  discussions  are  carried 
on  before  a  jury  of  expert  critics,  each  man  defend- 
ing his  own  views  against  the  views  of  those  who 
differ  from  him ;  and  the  jury  of  experts  ultimately 
gives  its  verdict,  to  which  sooner  or  later  the  com- 
munity at  large  submits.  The  religious  leader  gains 
his  influence  similarly.  He  gains  it  by  arguments 
and  persuasions,  which  are  felt  by  a  band  of  followers 
to  touch  the  spirit  more  deeply  than  those  of  other 
prophets.      He    gives    to    his    disciples,    and    his 


FIVE  DOMAINS   OF  ACTIVITY 


IS5 


disciples  give  to  the  multitude.     But  these  means     Bookii 

.  .  .  Chapter  3 

are  of  so  universal  a  kind,  and  have  so  little  con- 
nection with  any  specific  social  arrangements,  that 
none  of  the  disputed  points  of  social  politics  are 
involved  in  them ;  and  we  consequently  have  at 
present  no  occasion  to  discuss  them.  So,  too,  with 
regard  to  the  military  leader,  though  the  means  which 
are  employed  by  him  do,  beyond  a  doubt,  imply 
social  arrangements  of  a  very  specific  kind — namely, 
an  iron  system  of  discipline,  with  death  and  the  lash 
to  sanction  it ;  yet  these  arrangements,  however  they 
may  be  denounced  by  sentimentalists,  have  always 
been  found  essential  to  the  efficiency  of  every  army; 
and  though  many  worthy  people  would  abolish 
military  activity  altogether,  and  whilst  socialists 
especially  express  themselves  anxious  to  do  so,  it 
is  perfectly  evident  —  nor  would  any  socialist  deny 
it  —  that  a  socialist  State,  if  it  had  to  fight  for  its 
existence,  would  be  obliged  to  enforce  the  required 
military  discipline  by  methods  essentially  identical 
with  those  of  Caesar  or  WeUington.  It  may,  indeed, 
be  disputed  whether  the  great  military  leader  is 
not  a  superfluous  figure  on  the  social  stage;  but 
so  long  as  his  greatness  makes  itself  felt  at  all, 
it  will  continue  to  make  itself  felt  by  the  same 
means. 

The  only  domains  of  social  activity,  therefore,  in  we  need  con- 
which  the  means  employed   by  the  great  man  to  are^o^yln  ^^ 
control  the  actions  of  others  so  that  ordinary  men  o^f^pScs  and 
may  be  guided  by  the  faculties  of  the  exceptional — d^cirn^^"^ 
the  only  domains  of  activity  in  which  these  means, 


156 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  II 
Chapter  3 


The  question 
is  most  im- 
portant in  its 
bearings  on 
wealth-pro- 
duction. 


thus  employed,  really  require  minute  and  careful 
discussion,  and  have  really  a  direct  bearing  on  the 
practical  problems  of  the  day  —  are  the  domain  of 
economic  production  and  the  domain  of  political 
government.  These,  indeed,  may  be  said  to  contain 
between  them  the  whole  of  the  questions  with  regard 
to  which  parties  are  divided  —  with  regard  to  which 
those  who  believe  that  the  conditions  of  civilisation 
may  be  indefinitely  improved  but  can  never  be  funda- 
mentally altered,  are  divided  from  those  who  believe 
them  to  be  capable  of  indefinite  metamorphosis. 

This  is  specially  true  of  the  domain  of  economic 
production ;  for  it  is  mainly  on  account  of  its  con- 
nection with  the  production  and  distribution  of 
wealth  that  political  government  excites  so  much 
popular  interest  and  forms  the  subject  of  so  much 
vehement  controversy.  And  in  every  other  domain 
of  human  activity  equally,  we  shall  find  that  the 
interests,  the  endeavours,  and  the  disputes  of  men 
have  an  economic  process  as  their  basis,  or  economic 
progress  as  their  object.  The  processes  of  pro- 
duction and  commerce  are,  in  fact,  the  central 
processes  of  every  nation's  life.  Government  exists 
to  foster  them,  and  changes  its  form  as  these  pro- 
cesses develop,  whilst  fleets  and  armies  exist  mainly 
for  their  protection,  and  more  and  more  depend 
on  the  progress  that  takes  place  in  them.  It  is,  in 
short,  in  the  domain  of  economics  that  all  the  social 
problems  of  the  day  either  begin  or  end ;  and  con- 
sequently in  examining  the  means  by  which  the 
great  man  influences  others,  the  question  which  it  is 


SLAVERY  AND   THE    WAGE-SYSTEM         157 
really  our  first  concern  to  examine  relates  to  the  means     ^^^'^ " 

''  ,  .  Chapter  3 

by  which  great  men,  whose  greatness  consists  in  the 
fact  that  they  are  exceptional  in  their  powers  of  caus- 
ing the  production  of  wealth,  and  on  whom  conse- 
quently the  wealth  of  the  whole  community  depends, 
obtain  a  control  over  other  men's  productive  actions. 

This  control  can  be  secured  in  two  ways  only,  The  great  man 

.  ...  , .    in  wealth-pro- 

or  else  m  some  way  that  is  a  combmation  or  modi-  duction  can 
fication  of  both.     One  of  these  ways  is  slavery ;  the  L"ction"ofVthers 
other  is  the  capitalistic  wage-system.     Let  us  con-  oJiy!!.b/the 
sider  how  the  two  resemble  each  other,  and  also  how  siave-system 

and  the  wage- 

they  differ.  system. 

They  resemble  each  other  because  both,  in  so  far 
as  they  subserve  progress,  subserve  it  for  precisely 
the  same  reason.  They  are  both  contrivances  by 
which  the  superior  few  may  secure,  so  far  as  industry 
is  concerned,  the  implicit  obedience  of  the  many. 
On  the  private  lives  of  the  many  their  effects  will  be 
widelv  different ;  but  so  far  as  concerns  their  direct  The  slave- 

^      ,  ,  .  .  .  system  secures 

connection  with  industry  —  their  operation  on  men  obedience  by 

,        .  ,  ,  r  ^        1  '  1  coercion,  the 

during  the  actual  processes  of  production  —  slavery  wage-system 
and  the  capitalistic  wage-system  differ  only  in  this:  ^y inducement, 
that  the  one  secures  the  required  industrial  obedi- 
ence by  operating  on  men's  fears ;  the  other  secures 
it  by  operating  on  their  desires  and  wills.  Thus  the 
slaves  who  built  the  pyramids  had  each  some  speci- 
fied task — the  making  of  so  many  bricks,  the  cutting 
of  such  and  such  stones,  or  the  fixing  of  bricks  and 
stones  in  such  and  such  situations — which  had  to  be 
performed  if  the  pyramids  were  to  be  built  at  all. 
So,  too,  if  the  Hotel  Metropole  at  Brighton  was  to 


158  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  II      be  built  at  all,  the  bricklayers,  masons,  and  other 

Chapters  .        .  •' 

workmen  who  built  it  had  to  perform  tasks  of  a 
precisely  similar  kind.  But  obedience  to  orders  on 
the  part  of  the  Egyptian  slave  was  secured  by  the 
knowledge  on  his  part  that  disobedience  would  be 
punished  by  some  form  of  chastisement,  and  very 
likely  of  torture,  whilst  obedience  on  the  part  of  the 
Brighton  workman  was  secured  by  the  knowledge 
on  his  part  that,  unless  he  chose  to  yield  it,  one  way, 
at  all  events,  of  earning  a  livelihood  would  be  closed 
to  him. 

It  is  this  latter  method  of  securing  industrial 
obedience  that  is  made  possible  by  the  capitalistic 
wage-system ;  and  it  is  primarily  for  this  reason  that 
what  is  called  capitalism  is  an  agent  of  progress,  and 
has  developed  itself  in  progressive  communities.  As 
for  capital  itself,  this,  as  we  all  know,  performs  part 
of  its  functions  by  assuming  the  form  of  machinery, 
buildings,  bridges,  railways,  and  a  variety  of  struct- 
ures and  appliances  which  are  grouped  together 
under  the  general  head  of  fixed  capital  by  econo- 
mists. But  these  structures  and  appliances  are 
Wage-capital,  thcmsclves  the  result  of  the  previous  influence  of 

not  fixed  ,.,.,.  f    .  . 

capital,  gives    great  men  on  the  mdustnal  actions  of  the  many ;  and 

power'^^clpi-  ^s  it  was  by  means  of  wage-capital  that  this  influence 

proiTessye      ^^^  securcd,  the  primary  and  most  essential  functions 

agent.  which   Capital   fulfils,   and  which    really   form    the 

essence  of  the  capitalistic  system,  are  to  be  found  by 

considering  capital  as  employed  in  the  payment  of 

wages. 

Now  capital   as   thus   employed   consists   of   an 


CAPITAL  AS  ACCUMULATED  FOOD  159 

accumulation  of  the  necessaries  and  comforts  of  life,     ^^"^^  " 

11  •  1  r       1  •    1  11  Chapter  3 

by  the  consumption  and  use  of  which  men  are  able  to 
sustain  themselves  when  engaged  on  works  requir-  wage-capitai 
ing  a  long  period  for  their  completion,  which  will  lation  of  neces- 
when  completed  be  useful  and  produce  much,  but  ^^""°^^'^^" 
which,  until  they  are  completed,  will  be  of  no  use 
at  all,  and  will  consequently  supply  nothing  to 
the  workers  when  actually  engaged  on  them.  The 
simplest  example  of  work  of  this  kind  is  agriculture. 
The  first  man  who  saved  sufficient  food  to  support 
himself,  whilst  tilling  the  soil  and  waiting  for  his 
crops  to  ripen,  was  the  first  capitalist.  But  capital, 
when  it  takes  the  form  of  accumulated  necessaries 
and  comforts,  though  it  now  reaches  the  workers  in 
the  form  of  wages  usually,  need  not  do  so  of  neces- 
sity. It  need  not  do  so  when  the  work  is  extremely 
simple  and  the  methods  employed  are  rude.  Where- 
ever  agriculture,  for  example,  is  in  its  earliest  stages, 
every  husbandman  may  be  his  own  capitalist,  and 
start  with  an  accumulation  of  food  in  his  own  cottage 
which  will  keep  him  alive  till  his  crops  are  ready  for 
sale  or  for  consumption.  In  cases  such  as  these  we 
have  capital  which,  so  far  as  its  substance  is  con- 
cerned, is  identical  with  wage-capital,  but  is  not 
wage-capital  nevertheless.     In  order  to  turn  it  into  owned  or  con- 

...  ,  ,  ,       .  trolled  by  a 

wage-capital  it  is  necessary  that  these  accumulations  few  persons, 
of  food  shall  pass  out  of  the  control  of  the  workers 
—  such  as  the  husbandmen  just  referred  to  —  and  be 
brought  under  the  control  of  some  other  person  or 
persons,  who  will  dole  them  out  to  the  workers  on 
certain  conditions  only.    The  wage-system,  in  short, 


i6o  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  II     does  not  represent  capital  as  such.     It  represents 
capital,  in  the  form  of  the  immediate  means  of  sub- 
sistence, as  owned  or  controlled  by  a  small  number 
of  persons ;  and  its  efficiency  as  a  productive  agent 
resides  in  the  bargain  which  it  enables  any  great 
andappor-      man  posscssing  it  to  make  with  ordinary  workers  — 
amongs/    "^^  z.  bargain,  not  that  they  shall  work  such  and  such  a 
^eSTon-     number  of  hours  (for  that  they  would  have  to  do 
ditions.  were  each  man  his  own  employer),  but  that  they 

shall   do  their  work  in  accordance  with  the  great 
man's  directions. 

Now  this  fact  that  the  wage-system  represents 
the  control  of  capital  by  the  few  —  and  this  is  its 
essential  characteristic  —  is  the  fact  on  which,  more 
than  on  any  other,  the  socialistic  opponents  of  the 
modern  wage-system  insist.  They  are  never  weary 
of  insisting  that  it  has  its  foundation  in  a  monopoly. 
But  though  they  perceive  the  fact,  they  entirely 
Karl  Marx      miss  its  significance.     Karl  Marx  conceives  of  the 

entirely  mis-  •       t  i        i  r  i  r  i 

understood  Capitalists  as  a  body  oi  men  who,  so  lar  as  produc- 
Tonditio^s  are.  ^iou  is  conccmed,  are  absolutely  inert  and  passive. 
Owing  to  a  variety  of  causes,  he  says,  during  the 
past  four  hundred  years  all  the  means  of  pro- 
duction have  come  under  their  control,  and  access 
can  be  had  to  them  only,  as  it  were,  through 
gates,  of  which  these  tyrants  hold  the  key.  Out- 
side are  the  manual  labourers,  who  are  the  sole 
producers  of  wealth,  but  who,  without  the  means 
of  production,  naturally  can  produce  nothing  — 
not  even  enough  to  live  on;  and  the  sole  economic 
function  which    the  capitalist  fulfils    is   to  let  the 


ESSENTIAL  FUNCTION  OF  WAGE-CAPITAL     i6i 

labourers  in  every  day  through  the  gates,  on  the  ^'^^^ " 
condition  that  every  evening  the  unhappy  men 
render  up  to  him  the  whole  produce  of  their 
labours,  except  that  insignificant  fraction  of  it 
which  is  just  necessary  to  fit  them  for  the  labours 
of  the  day  following.  Now  it  is  no  doubt  theoreti- 
cally possible  that  a  society  might  exist,  composed 
of  a  mass  of  undifferentiated  and  undirected 
manual  labourers  on  the  one  hand,  and  on  the 
other  of  a  few  passive  monopolists  who  extracted 
from  them  most  of  what  they  produced,  as  the 
price  of  allowing  them  the  opportunity  of  produc- 
ing anything;  but  it  is  perfectly  certain  that  a 
society  of  this  kind  would  exhibit  none  of  the  in- 
creasing productive  power  which,  as  even  Marx 
and  his  school  admit,  is  one  of  the  most  distinctive 
features  of  industry  under  the  capitalistic  wage- 
system.  Under  that  system  productive  power  has 
increased,  not  because  capital  has  enabled  a  few 
men  to  remain  idle,  but  because  it  has  enabled  a 
few  men  to  apply,  with  the  most  constant  and  in-  The  essence  of 

these  con- 

tense  effort,  their  intellectual  faculties  to  industry  in  ditions  is  that 
its  minutest  details.     It  has  increased  not  because  be^^hnIcally 
the  monopoly  of  capital  has  enabled  the  few  to  say  fj^"*^'^  ^^  *^* 
to  the  many,  "  We  will  allow  you  to  work  at  noth- 
ing, unless  you  give  us  most  of  what  you  produce," 
but  because  it  has  enabled  them  to  say  to  the  many, 
"  We  will  allow  you  to  work  at  nothing,  unless  you 
will  consent  to  work  in  the  ways  that  we  indicate 
to  you." 

The   few,   so  far    as   our   present    argument   is 


X62 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  II      concerned,    may    appropriate    much    of    the    gross 
product  or  Uttle ;  or  they  may  leave  the  whole  of 

What 


the  few 
appropriate  of 
the  product  is 
a  separate 
question 
altogether. 


it  to  be  divided  amongst  their  employees. 
The  question    ^j^gy  actually  havc  done,  or  do,  or  may  do,  in  this 

of  how  much  •'  .         •'  .  i  i         -ii    i 

respect,  is  another  question  altogether,  and  will  be 
discussed  hereafter  separately.  The  essence  of  the 
wage-system,  in  so  far  as  it  has  influenced  the  act- 
ual processes  of  production,  is  in  the  power  it 
gives  to  the  few  to  direct  the  producers,  not  in  the 
power  it  gives  them  to  appropriate  the  products. 
It  will  indeed  require  very  little  reflection  to  show 
us  that  if  the  great  men  in  the  industrial  world 
would  only  develop  and  use  their  faculties,  without 
any  motive  of  ambition  or  self-interest  to  stimulate 
them,  —  as  indeed  at  the  present  moment  we  are 
assuming  that  they  do  —  they  could  use  the  wage- 
system  for  the  purpose  of  directing  industry  merely 
by  monopolising  the  control  of  capital  without 
monopolising,  and  even  without  sharing  in,  its 
possession. 
lYi^  corvee  This    truth  will   become   plainer   still   when  we 

system  or  . .  ,  .  .  mi 

slavery  would  reflcct  that  if  Only  certain  conditions  prevailed 
MpitliTuptr-  which  in  many  civilised  countries  survived  till  quite 
SruTthey"show  rcceutly,  the  whole  process  of  production  as  we  now 
us  what  the      have   it  mis^ht   be  carried    on  without   any  wage- 

essential  ^  ^  ,    ,  jo 

function  of      Capital  at  all.     These  conditions  are  those  of  the 

such  capital  is.  ^  ,  i  i  •    i  -  i      i^i  i 

corvee  system,  under  which  peasants  and  others  who 
owned  the  lands  upon  which  they  lived,  and  main- 
tained themselves  on  those  lands  in  a  certain  posi- 
tion of  independence,  were  compelled  to  place  their 
labour,  for  so  many  days  a  week,  at  the  absolute 


WAGE-CAPITAL  A  MEANS   OF  GUIDANCE     163 
disposal  of  this  or  that  superior.     Such  a  system,  if     Book  11 

...  .      ,  ''  Chapters 

apphed  to  modern  mdustry,  would  have,  no  doubt, 
many  incidental  disadvantages ;  but  if  only  a  number 
of  independent  peasant-proprietors  could  be  forced 
to  give  half  their  time  to  the  proprietor  of  a 
neighbouring  factory,  and  during  that  time  to  work 
in  it  under  his  orders,  the  entire  use  and  necessity  of 
wage-capital  would  in  theory,  at  all  events,  be  gone. 
The  same  thing  is  also  true  of  slavery,  between 
which  and  the  wage-system  the  corvee  system  stands 
midway.  Like  the  peasant-proprietor,  who  is 
forced  to  give  part  of  his  labour  to  his  over-lord, 
the  slave  is  supplied  with  the  necessaries  of  life 
independently  of  his  obedience  to  the  detailed 
orders  of  his  task-master.  The  peasant  maintains 
himself  by  tilling  his  own  fields ;  the  slave-owner 
feeds  his  slave  just  as  he  would  feed  an  animal.  In 
neither  case  is  the  giving  or  the  withholding  of  a 
livelihood  used  as  the  motive  or  sanction  by  which 
industrial  obedience  is  ensured.  Obedience  is 
ensured  by  the  direct  application  of  force,  or  the 
knowledge  on  the  slave's  part  or  the  peasant's  that 
force  will  be  applied  if  necessary. 

It  will,  no  doubt,  be  urged  by  some  that  whatever  so-caiied  |' co- 
assistance  is  afforded  by  the  talents  of  the  few  to  the  merely  the 
industrial  efforts  of  the  many,  may  be  secured  by  dSluTsed!"* 
a  third  means,  which  is  neither  slavery  nor  yet  the 
wage-system  —  that  is  to  say,  by  what  is  called  the 
system  of  "  co-operation."     Co-operative  production, 
however,  when  it  differs  in  anything  except  in  name 
from  production  as  carried  on  under  the  ordinary 


i64  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  II  wage-system,  differs  from  it  only  in  being  the  wage- 
system  under  a  thin  disguise.  For  the  ideal  co- 
operative factory  is  simply  a  factory  in  which  all 
the  shareholders  are  workers,  and  all  the  workers 
are  shareholders,  and  in  which,  being  shareholders, 
they  elect  their  manager.  Under  such  conditions, 
each  of  these  working  shareholders  may  receive  his 
remuneration  under  the  form,  not  of  wages,  but  of 
profits.  But  if  any  shareholder,  or  any  group  of 
shareholders,  should  systematically  shirk  working, 
or  disobey  the  manager's  orders,  the  whole  or  a 
part  of  the  payment  that  would  be  otherwise  due  to 
him  would  be  withheld ;  for  unless  some  regulation 
of  this  kind  were  in  force,  it  would  be  impossible  to 
ensure  any  co-operation  amongst  the  co-operators, 
or  any  order,  or  any  equality  of  diligence.  Each 
worker's  profits,  then,  are  in  reality  his  wages,  being 
essentially  a  payment  which  is  made  to  him  only 
on  condition  that  he  performs  certain  specified  tasks 
in  a  certain  specified  way. 
There  are.  We  are  thus  brous^ht  back  to  the  point  from  which 

then,  only  two  111  1        i  1 

alternatives—  wc  startcd — uamcly,  that  there  are  two  methods  only 
systrm^and  the  by  which,  in  the  domain  of  industry,  the  superior 
slave-system;  faculties  of  the  fcw  cau  dircct  the  faculties  of  the 
many:  firstly,  the  capitalistic  wage-system,  which 
is  the  method  of  inducement;  secondly,  slavery, 
complete  or  partial,  which  is  the  method  of  coercion. 
And  of  the  truth  of  this  assertion  the  reader  shall 
now  be  presented  with  a  highly  interesting  and 
curiously  conclusive  proof,  taken  from  the  very  last 
quarter  in  which  he  would  naturally  expect  to  find 


SOCIALISM  ESSENTIALLY  A  SLAVE-SYSTEM    165 
it.     This  proof  is  afforded  us  by  the  schemes  which,      ^ook  11 

.  .  \  f.  Chapter  3 

with  ever-increasing  clearness,  have  of  recent  years 
been  put  forward  by  all  the  more  thoughtful 
socialists. 

These   enthusiasts,  who   are  still   careful  to  tell  ^^  ^^  =^^i' 

find  by  con- 
US  that  they  regard  the  wage-system  as  the  source  sidenng  how 

.        ,,  •    1  M         1  1  11  •  i      the  socialists 

of   all   social    evils,    have    been    slowly   coming   to  can  oniy 
perceive  that  the  ability  with  which  the  labour  is  wag?-!y?tem 
directed  is  as  important  a  factor  in  production  as  the  ^7  substituting 

...  .  slavery. 

labour  itself,  which  is  directed  by  it.  They  propose 
accordingly  to  regenerate  the  human  race  by 
transferring  the  ownership  of  capital  from  private 
employers,  not  to  groups  of  factory-hands,  as  the 
*'  co-operators "  propose,  but  to  the  State ;  and  by 
substituting  for  the  private  employers  a  hierarchy 
of  State  officials.  Now  these  officials,  so  far  as  the 
wage-system  is  concerned,  if  they  differed  at  all  from 
private  employers  of  to-day,  would  and  could  differ 
from  them  in  the  following  way  only.  The  present 
dispensers  of  wages  assign  the  means  of  sub- 
sistence to  each  worker  in  proportion  to  the 
exactness,  intelligence,  and  efficiency  with  which  he 
obeys  orders.  The  dispensers  of  wages  under 
socialism  would  dispense  these  means  daily  to  every 
worker  alike,  with  no  immediate  reference  to  his  in- 
dustrial actions  whatsoever;  and  the  direction  of 
his  actions  would  be  a  second  and  wholly  distinct 
process. 

That  such  is  the  case  is  shown,  and  indeed 
distinctly  admitted,  in  a  preface  to  the  American 
edition  of  Fabian  Essays.     It  is  there  stated  that 


i66  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  II      -vvith  regard  to  the  apportionment  of  the  means  of 

Chapter  3 

subsistence,  the  only  "  truly  socialistic  "  scheme  is 
one  which  would  "  absolutely  abolish  "  all  economic 
distinctions,  "  and  the  possibility  of  their  again 
arising,  by  making  an  equal  provision  for  the 
maintenance  of  all  an  incident  and  an  indefeasible 
condition  of  citizenship,  without  any  regard  whatever 
to  the  relative  specific  services  of  differe^it  citizeiis. 
For  they  would  Xhc  Ycnderi^ig  of  such  services ^  on  the  other  hand, 

secure  in-  .  1       r  1     '  r    r  j  •  r      1  •    •  •/ 

dustriai  instead  of  being  left  to  the  option  of  the  citizen,  with 

coercionT  ^  the  alternative  of  Starvation,  would  be  required  under 
07te  uniform  law  or  civic  duty,  precisely  like  other 
form,s  of  taxation  or  military  serviced 

Such,  then,  is  the  most  advanced  socialistic  pro- 
gramme —  the  programme  of  the  men  who  have  set 
themselves  to  devise  an  escape  from  capitalism. 
An  escape  from  capitalism  it  may  be ;  but  it  is  an 
escape  into  complete  slavery.  For  the  very  essence 
of  the  position  of  the  slave,  as  contrasted  with 
not  through     the  wagc-labourer,  so  far   as  the   direction   of   his 

the  worker's  .  .  1      •         1  1         i 

own  desire  to  productivc  actious  are  concerned,  is  that  he  has 
And  thfs  ilTe  not  to  work  as  he  is  bidden  in  order  to  gain 
essence  of       j^jg  livelihood,  but  that,  his  livelihood  beino^  assured 

slavery.  '  '  o 

to  him,  he  has  to  work  as  he  is  bidden  in  order  that 
he  may  avoid  the  lash,  or  some  other  form  of 
punishment;  and  amongst  all  the  more  thoughtful 
socialists  there  is  now  a  consensus  of  admission  that 
the  socialistic  State  would  necessarily  have  in  reserve 
the  severest  pains  and  penalties  for  the  idle  and  the 
careless  and  the  disobedient. 

Since,  then — let  us   once   more  repeat  it — the 


CAPITALISM  AND  PROGRESSIVE  STRUGGLE  167 
progress  and  maintenance  of  economic  civilisation     ^^Q^^  ^' 

^  .      .  .         •  Chapter  3 

depend,  as  even  socialists  are  now  beginning  to 
perceive,  on  the  industrial  actions  of  average  men 
being  subjected  to  the  control  of  exceptional  men, 
and  since  this  control  can  be  secured  by  two  methods 
only  —  that  of  the  wage-payer  and  that  of  the  slave- 
owner—  it  is  evident  that  all  progress  and  civilisa- 
tion implies  the  existence  of  either  one  system  or 
the  other,  and  that  socialists  accordingly,  in  propor- 
tion as  they  reject  the  wage-system,  are  obliged  to 
replace  it  by  what  is  essentially  the  system  of 
slavery. 

We  have  thus  far,  however,  dealt  with  but  one 
half  of  our  subject.     We  have  considered  merely  the  Next  let  us 

^  ■'  .  .  consider  the 

means  by  which  any  one  great  man  exercises  indus-  means  by 
trial  control  over  the  actions  of  a  number  of  ordinary  great  directors 
men.     We  have  still  to  consider  the  means  by  which  °o^p",J''^ 
the  most  efficient  of  the  great  men  get  this  control  against  one 

"  ^  "-*  another. 

into  their  own  hands,  and  take  it  out  of  the  hands 
of  the  less  efficient. 

Under  the  regime  oi  private  capitalism  this  process  under  capital- 

(^    .  ft  ism  they  do 

is  simple.     The  fitness  or  efficiency  of  each  great  so.  owing  to 
man  is  according  to  the  acceptability  to  the  public  Jheman^ho 
of  the  goods  or  services  which  he  offers  them.     If  ^^""°'  '^'"^''^ 

o  mdustry  so  as 

the  public  are  not  pleased  with  these  goods  and  ser- topieasethe 

1111  •    P"t)lic,  loses 

Vices,  they  do  not  buy  or  demand  them ;  and  the  capi-  his  capital,  and 
tal  of  the  man  by  whom  they  are  offered,  not  being  JJ!,eJsof^ 
renewed  by  any  money  received,  melts  in  his  hands,  direction, 
and  with  it   his  control   over  other   men's   labour. 
Meanwhile,  by  a  converse  process,  the  great  men 
who  offer  goods  and  services  which  the  public  desire 


x68 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  II 

Chapter  3 


The  wage- 
system  is  the 
only  efficient 
means  of  com- 
petition of  this 
kind. 


The  socialists, 
though  they 
affect  to  be 
opposed  to 
competition 
altogether, 


and  find  serviceable,  renew  and  increase  by  their 
payments  the  capital  which  has  been  disbursed  by 
him,  and  renew  and  increase  his  control  over  other 
men's  labour  along  with  it. 

Now  if  the  wage-system  is  the  sole  alternative  to 
slavery  as  a  means  by  which  the  great  man  controls 
the  actions  of  the  ordinary  man,  it  is  still  more 
obviously  the  sole  alternative  to  slavery  as  a  means 
by  which  one  great  man,  in  controlling  them,  shall 
compete  against  another  great  man.  Indeed,  we 
may  speak  still  more  strongly.  We  may  say  not 
only  that  it  is  the  sole  alternative  means,  but  that 
it  is  the  sole  efficient  means.  And  if  we  desire  a 
proof  of  this,  all  we  have  to  do  is  to  repeat  our 
former  procedure,  and  consider  how  the  socialists 
propose  to  supply  its  place. 

It  is,  no  doubt,  true  that  when  we  first  begin  this 
consideration  it  does  not  appear  that  we  should 
derive  from  it  much  direct  enlightenment ;  because, 
if  we  may  go  by  what  the  socialists  themselves  tell 
us,  one  of  their  principal  objects  is  to  abolish  com- 
petition altogether.  Their  protestations,  however, 
with  regard  to  this  matter  betray  a  most  curious 
and  most  amusing  confusion  of  thought.  They 
declare  that  competition  must  be  abolished  because 
it  inflicts  misery  on  the  majority  —  that  is  to  say, 
on  the  weakest  in  what  they  call  the  "■  ctit-throat 
struggle!'  But,  as  was  shown  at  great  length  in 
the  last  chapter,  competition  means  two,  and  two 
absolutely  distinct  things  —  one  being  a  struggle 
to   live,   the   other   a   struggle   to   dominate;    and 


SOCIALISTS   ON  COMPETITION  169 

the  effects  of  the  two  on  the  majority  are  altogether  ^°°^  " 
different.  To  this  fundamental  truth  the  social- 
ists are  completely  blind.  The  struggle  to  live, 
or,  in  other  words,  the  struggle  to  secure  em- 
ployment, no  doubt,  when  it  is  severe,  does  entail 
suffering  on  the  strugglers.  But  this  struggle, 
though  it  often  accompanies  progress,  under  the 
capitalistic  system  is  not  essential  to  it  —  as  is 
shown  by  the  fact  that  when  such  progress  is 
most  rapid  the  struggle  in  question  tends  to  dis- 
appear altogether;  for  the  competition  is  then 
amongst  the  employers  to  find  labour,  rather  than 
amongst  the  labourers  to  find  employment.  Now 
if  the  struggle  for  employment  could  be  obviated 
by  any  kind  of  social  reform,  an  indubitable  benefit 
would,  no  doubt,  be  conferred  on  the  workers 
generally.  But  just  as  this  struggle  for  work  or 
for  existence  —  this  struggle  of  one  worker  against 
another  —  is  not  essential  to  the  capitalistic  wage- 
system,  and  certainly  did  not  originate  with  it,  and 
just  as  that  system  would  not  necessarily  be 
abolished  by  its  overthrow,  so  it  is  not  the  kind  of 
competition  against  which  the  socialists  direct  their 
main  attacks.  Their  main  attacks  are  directed 
against  the  struggle  between  the  wage-payers,  not 
the  wage-earners — that  is  to  say,  against  the  strug- 
gle not  for  existence,  but  for  domination ;  and  the 
struggle  for  domination  has  on  the  workers  generally 
no  evil  effects  at  all,  except  such  as  are  occasional 
and  accidental.  On  the  contrary,  the  workers  are  as 
much  interested  in  its  maintenance  as  anybody ;  for 


I70  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  II      not  only  does  it  inflict  no  injury  on  themselves,  but 

Chapters  ^  '•'.... 

to  it  that  progress  in  the  processes  of  production  is 
due  on  which  their  own  hopes  depend,  as  much 
as  do  those  of  their  employers.  Accordingly,  the 
socialists,  profound  thinkers  as  they  are,  propose  to 
abolish  the  competition  by  which  the  workers  bene- 
fit, because  they  confuse  it  with  competition  by 
which  the  workers  suffer.  The  point,  however, 
which  concerns  us  here  is  not  that  they  have  made 
a  blunder  as  to  the  kind  of  competition  which  they 
re-introduce  it  shouM  attack,  but  that  the  kind  of  competition 
system.  which  they  declare  themselves  pledged  to  abolish, 

as  a  thing  accursed,  and  the  root  of  all  social  evils, 
they  really  reintroduce  into  their  own  programme, 
altered  only  by  being  associated  with  the  system  of 
slavery,  and  by  being  robbed  of  its  practical  effi- 
ciency, and  robbed  of  nothing  else, 
the  only  por  our  coutemporary  socialists,  who  have  at  last 

change  being  .J  •'  ...  r    i    i  i 

that  it  is         come  to  perceive  that  the  productivity  or  labour  de- 

thrsTave-  ^'    pcnds  ou  the  ability  with  which  it  is  directed,  perceive 

L^ve™'*^"^'^   also  the  fact  that,  out  of  many  possible  directors,  some 

cumbrous  and  would  dircct  it  far  more  efficiently  than  others.    They 

also  perceive  the  fact  that  the  directors  of  labour, 

who,  according  to  their  proposals,  would  be  officials 

of  the  bureaucratic  State,  could  prove  their  efficiency 

only  by  practical  experiment.     Now  if   all    capital 

were,  as  socialists  propose  it  should  be,  owned  by 

the  State,  and  if  all  the  means  of  subsistence  were 

apportioned  amongst  the  citizens  equally,  without 

reference  to  the  work  performed  by  them ;  and  if  all 

the  directors  of  labour,  whether  inventors  or  business 


COMPETITION  INVOLVED  IN  SOCIALISM     171 
ororanisers,  had  to  act  as  State  officials,  or  else  not    ^°'''^  " 

^  '  .  .  Chapters 

act  at  all,  the  practical  experiments  necessary  to 
show  which  officials  were  the  fittest  could  be 
brought  about  only  by  the  State  investing  such 
and  such  of  them  with  a  quasi-military  power  over 
so  many  regiments  of  labourers  for  such  and  such  a 
time,  which  power  would  be  renewed  if  they  could 
persuade  the  State  to  reappoint  them,  or  taken 
from  them  if  the  State  should  be  persuaded  that 
some  other  men,  their  rivals,  would  employ  this 
power  more  usefully.  And  this  is  precisely  what 
the  proposals  of  the  socialists  come  to.  The  whole 
multitude  of  State  officials  who  would  direct 
socialistic  industry  would,  according  to  every 
socialistic  programme,  be  appointed,  promoted,  or 
degraded  to  the  ranks  of  ordinary  workers  in 
accordance  with  the  efficiency  shown  by  them 
in  the  practical  command  of  labour.  Some 
socialists  propose  that  these  officials  should  owe 
their  appointment  to  a  central  governing  body ; 
others  propose  that  they  should  owe  them  to 
popular  election ;  but,  in  either  case,  appointment, 
promotion,  or  degradation  would  necessarily  and 
avowedly,  if  it  did  not  depend  on  favouritism, 
depend  on  the  practical  results  which  the  different 
men  in  question  elicited  from  labour  by  their 
different  methods  of  directing  it.  In  other  words, 
the  whole  system  of  socialistic  production  would 
involve  and  depend  on  competition ;  and  the  only 
essential  difference  between  this  bureaucratic  com- 
petition   under   socialism   and   the  competition  of 


172  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  II      capitalists  which   socialists  so   furiously  denounce, 

Chapters       ,    *■  .        .  .  •' 

is  that  whilst  the  capitalists  obtain  control  over 
labour  by  means  of  wages,  which  control,  by  a 
natural  and  automatic  process,  is  gradually  extin- 
guished unless  it  is  used  efficiently,  the  competitors 
for  office  under  socialism  would  obtain  the  same 
control  by  compulsory  powers  with  which  the  State 
would  invest  them,  and  which  they  would  lose  or 
retain  at  the  pleasure  of  some  more  or  less  arbitrary 
authority. 
Competition         Competition,    then,    between    the    directors    of 

between  ^  ...  ir-ii 

employers.      labour  —  or,  as  it  is  here  defined,  the  struggle  for 
ofTv'eVsociai  ludustrial   domination  —  is  as  much  a  part  of   the 
permUs*or      thcorctical    regime  of   socialism  as  it  is  a  part  of 
progress,        \\^q  actual  regime  of  capitalism.    The  only  differences 
between  the  two  consist,  firstly,  in  the  means  by 
which  labour  is  directed,  coercion  being  employed 
in  one  case,  and  in   the  other  the    inducement  of 
wages ;  and,  secondly,  in  the  means  by  which  the 
fittest  director  is  placed  in  power,  and  the  less  fit 
deprived  of  it  —  an  official  body  deciding  the  mat- 
ter in  the  one  case,  and  the  mass  of  the  consuming 
public  deciding  it  in  the  other  for  themselves, 
but  since  the        Now   wc    may    safcly   say   that    the    regime    of 

re-introduction  ,  ,  .  ,        . 

of  slavery  is     industrial    coercion,    or    slavery,    even    though    it 

Fmp'osstbJ'e,  we  sliould  bear  the  name  of  socialism,  is  not  in  these 

t'hewlge-"^     days  possible.     It  is  impossible  for  two  reasons  — 

system  Q^e,  that  it  is  out  of  harmony  with  the  sentiments 

of    the   modern   world;    and    the    other  —  equally 

strong,  though  not  so  generally  avowed  —  that  it  is 

an  exceedingly  clumsy  and  wasteful  instrument  of 


PERMANENT  NATURE    OF   WAGE-SYSTEM    173 

competition.     We  may,  accordingly,  dismiss  it  from    ^^^^  " 

our  consideration;  and  such  being  the  case,  there 

remains  for  us  the  absolute  certainty  that  if  society  is  as  a  permanent 

.,  '11  •/■••  feature  of 

to  make  any  further  mdustrial  advance,  or  11  it  is  to  progressive 
save  itself  from  a  relapse  into  industrial  helplessness,  ^°"^ '"' 
the  capitalistic  wage-system,  and  with  it  capitalistic 
competition,  or,  in  other  words,  the  competitive 
struesfle  for  domination,  must  both  of  them  be  con- 
tinued  under  some  form  or  other ;  nor,  although  they 
may  be  modified  in  an  indefinite  number  of  their  de- 
tails, is  there  any  apparent  possibility  of  ever  modi- 
fying them  in  any  of  their  essentials.  Indeed,  the 
great  moral  to  be  drawn  from  the  facts  that  have  been 
here  elucidated  is  that  if  any  one  institution  in  the 
modern  world  threatens  to  be  permanent,  that  institu- 
tion is  the  capitalistic  wage-system ;  and  all  proposed 
alterations  in  it  we  may  set  down  as  impossible  in 
precise  proportion  as  the  socialists  attach  value  to 
them.  The  foolish  dreamers  who  imagine  that  they 
can  overthrow  it,  consider  only  its  outer  aspect,  and 
not  the  forces  of  which  it  is  the  expression.     It  is  we  might 

^  .  reduce  society 

perfectly  true  that  this  system  might  at  any  given  to  ashes,  but 

,      .  .  ,1  11  this  system 

time,  and    in    any  given  country,  be  paralysed    or  and  capitalistic 
reduced  to  ashes ;  but  the  forces  that  would  over-  3^^^°" 
throw  it  would  be  essentially  non-productive.     The  ^e^'"  °"^  of 
men  who  destroyed  it  would  find  themselves  power- 
less without  it,  and  would  be  obliged  to  submit  to, 
and  assist  in,  its  reconstruction.     For  the  outer  form 
of  capitalism  is  not  what   capitalism  is,  any  more 
than  a  painter's   brush   is   the   power   that   paints 
great  pictures.     Capitalism,  in  its  essence,  is  merely 


174  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  II     ti^g  realised  process  of  the  more  efficient  members 

Chapter  3  *■ 

of  the  human  race  controlling  and  guiding  the  less 

efficient;    capitalistic  competition  is  the  means  by 

for  capitalistic  which,  out  of  thcsc  morc  efficient  members,  society 

competition        .         ir        1  1  1  •     1  1  • 

means  the       itsclf  sclccts  thosc  who  scrvc  it  bcst ;  and  no  society 

domination  of         i'i'<i.  •  ••i'i  i*  j_ 

the  fittest  great  which  intcnds  to  remain  civilised,  and  is  not  pre- 


men. 


pared  to  return  to  the  direct  coercion  of  slavery, 
can  escape  from  competition  and  the  wage-system, 
under  some  form  or  other,  any  more  than  it  can 
stand  in  its  own  shadow. 

With  regard,  then,  to  economic  production,  which, 
of  all  social  activities,  is  for  the  practical  sociologist 
incomparably  the  most  important,  what  we  have 
thus  far  seen  is  as  follows.  We  have  seen,  not  that 
it  is  impossible  —  for  this  question  has  been  expressly 
postponed  —  that  men  may  be  made  far  more  equal 
than  they  are  now  in  respect  of  the  possession  of 
wealth ;  but  that  whatever  degree  of  equality  they 
may  some  day  attain  to  in  its  possession,  they  can 
never  be  otherwise  than  unequal  in  the  parts  played 
The  industrial  by  them  in  its  production ;  that  their  inequality  in 

obedience  of"^.  ,  ii-i  11 

the  many  to  productivc  powcr  IS  oi  such  a  Kind  as  to  render  the 
fundamentaf  industrial  obedicncc  of  the  larger  number  of  them  to 
^ro'^"T°^  the  minority  the  primary  and  permanent  condition 
on  which  economic  progress  is  possible ;  that  what 
feather-brained  fanatics  call  "  economic  freedom " 
would  be  merely  another  name  for  economic  help- 
lessness ;  and  that  all  the  democratic  formulas  which 
for  the  past  hundred  years  have  represented  the 
employed  as  the  producers  of  wealth,  and  the  capi- 
talistic employers  as  the  appropriators   of   it,  are, 


THE  FEW  ARE   THE    CHIEF  PRODUCERS    175 
instead  of  beino:,  as  they  claim  to  be,  the  expressions      ^^^'^ " 

°  -^  ^  Chapter  3 

of  a  profound  truth,  related  to  truth  only  as  being 
direct  inversions  of  it.  Whatever  appearances  may 
seem  to  show  to  the  contrary,  it  is  the  few  and  not 
the  many  who,  in  the  domain  of  economic  produc- 
tion, are  essentially  and  permanently  the  chief  re- 
positories of  power.  That  this  is  so  in  the  domain 
of  intellect  we  have  seen  already.  We  will  now 
turn  our  attention  to  the  domain  of  political  govern- 
ment, and  consider  the  part  played  by  the  excep- 
tional few  there  —  the  nature  and  origin  of  their 
power,  and  the  means  by  which  it  is  exercised. 


CHAPTER   IV 

THE     MEANS     BY    WHICH     THE    GREAT     MAN    ACQUIRED 
POWER    IN    POLITICS 


In  discussing    In   discussing,  with  reference  to  political   govern- 

the  means  by  i  i  •    i      i  11 

which  the  great  ment,  the  mcans  by  which  the  great  man  controls  the 
po^werin  ^  actions  of  others,  it  will  be  found  that  the  point  on 
politics  the      which  we  shall  have  to  concentrate  our  attention 

debatable 

question  differs  differs  somcwhat  from  that  which  engaged  it  when 

from  the  ques-  .  .  .   .  , 

tion  raised  by  wc  wcrc  discussmg  the  samc  question  with  reference 
indus°l^T '"  to  economic  production.  For  all  the  points  which, 
with  reference  to  the  directors  of  industry,  it  was 
necessary  to  establish  in  opposition  to  the  socio- 
logical sophistries  of  to-day  are,  with  reference  to 
the  political  governor,  admitted  by  all  alike.  Thus 
we  shall  find  on  reflection  that  the  extremest  demo- 
cratic reformer,  no  less  than  the  aristocrat  or  the 
for  the  points    strict    upholdcr   of  autocracy,    admits,    firstly,    that 

that  are  de-  _  ^  •'  ,  •' 

bated  in  the  Satisfactory  governors  must  be  exceptional  or  great 
great°weaith-  mcn ;  sccondly,  that  the  fittest  great  men  can  be 
admiSbraii  sccurcd  by  competition  only  ;  and,  thirdly,  that  how- 
in  the  case  of   gygj.  ^|^gy  ^j-g  appointed,  and  whatever  may  be  the 

the  governor.  ...  . 

principles  on  which  they  govern,  their  orders  must 
in    every   case    be  enforced  by  virtually  the  same 

176 


THE  PROGRESSIVE  STRUGGLE  IN  POLITICS  177 
sanctions.     The  last  of  these  three  facts  —  namely,     Book  11 

•'         Chapter  4 

that  the  commands  of  the  governor  must  be  en- 
forced by  some  system  of  restraint  and  punishment 
for  the  disobedient  —  is  sufficiently  plain  to  require 
no  further  notice ;  but  the  two  others,  obvious  as 
they  really  are,  are  not  perhaps  generally  realised, 
and  it  will  be  well  to  give  a  few  words  to  them. 

That  the  efficient  [governor,  though  he  need  not  t^^  e^^^^^^^* 

*--'  ,  "  democrats 

always  be  a  genius,  must  in  some  respects,  at  all  admit  that  the 
events,  be  a  great  or  exceptional  man,  is  of  course  must  be  an 
admitted  by  the  advocates  of  autocracy,  aristocracy,  manr'°"*' 
or  oligarchy.     All  that  requires  to  be  shown  is  that 
it  is  admitted  also  by  the   thinkers  who  are  most 
opposed  to  them  —  by  socialists  and  extreme  demo- 
crats.    This  admission  on  their  part  is  implied  in 
the  notorious  importance  attached  by  them  to  the 
machinery  of  popular  election ;  for  popular  election 
is   simply  an    elaborate    means    of   expressing   the 
opinion  of  the  people  that  out  of  so  many  possible 
governors,  this  one  or  that    one   is  endowed  with 
greater  capacity  than  the  others.     If  the  capacities 
of  all  were   equal,  or  if   exceptional   capacity  was 
not  required,  the  personnel  oi  the  government  might  and  also  that 

^  '  ^  o  ^        he  must  be 

be  chosen  by  casting  lots.  Next,  as  to  the  question  chosen  by 
of  competition,  it  must  be  obvious  to  every  one  that  competition. 
the  popular  election  of  governors  is  not  only  an 
admission  that  some  few  men  out  of  many  are 
greater  or  more  capable  than  the  rest,  but  is  also, 
on  the  part  of  the  candidates  for  election  themselves, 
competition  in  one  of  its  intensest  and  most  sharply 
accentuated  forms. 


178 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  II 
Chapter  4 

There  is  a 
competitive 
element  even 
in  autocracies, 


and  democ- 
racies are 
essentially 
competitive. 


Competition,  indeed,  is  implicit  in  every  form  of 
government.  Were  it  absent  in  any,  it  would  be 
absent  in  complete  autocracies ;  but  even  in  these 
it  is  latent,  and  always  ready  to  come  into  operation ; 
for  the  most  absolute  autocrat,  if  he  happen  to  make 
his  rule  sufficiently  odious  to  a  sufficient  number  of 
his  subjects,  — ''' postqua^n  cerdonibus  esse  timendus 
cosperat "  —  will,  as  history  shows  us,  be  assassinated 
or  orot  rid  of  somehow,  and  some  other  candidate 
for  power,  probably  an  autocrat  also,  will  be  put  in 
his  place,  and  will  either  retain  or  lose  it,  according 
as  experiment  shows  him  to  be  a  tolerable  ruler,  or 
the  reverse.  Here  is  political  competition  in  its 
most  rudimentary  form;  but  it  is  competition  none 
the  less ;  and  it  generally  involves  a  competition 
more  advanced  than  itself;  for  the  most  absolute 
autocrat  is  obliged  to  govern  through  ministers ;  and 
these  rise  and  fall  according  as  experiment  shows 
them  to  be  fitter  or  less  fit  for  the  accomplishment 
of  their  master's  purposes.  If,  then,  even  the  power 
of  the  autocrat  rests  ultimately  on  competition  and 
practical  experiment,  much  more  does  the  power  of 
government,  under  aristocratic  and  oligarchic  con- 
stitutions. Oligarchies  invariably  aim  at  ruling 
through  their  strongest  members ;  and  which  are 
the  strongest  is  shown  by  experimental  competition 
only ;  whilst  political  democracy,  under  all  its  forms, 
is  experimental  competition  open  and  undisguised. 
A  Gladstone  remains  in  power  because,  as  his  years 
of  office  succeed  each  other,  he  satisfies  the  majority 
by  the  manner  in  which  he  governs  them ;  and  his 


THE  GUIDE  VERSUS  THE  REPRESENTATIVE  179 
power  is  taken  from  him  when  the  majority  cease     Book  11 

,  ,  .     .  Chapter  4 

to  be  satisfied,  not  only  because  they  are  of  opmion 
that  he  governs  badly,  but  because  they  are  of 
opinion  that  a  Disraeli  will  govern  better.  A  democ- 
racy, in  fact,  and  an  oligarchy,  so  far  as  competi- 
tion is  concerned,  differ  merely  in  the  way  in  which 
the  competitors  are  admitted  to  the  arena,  and 
in  the  number  and  character  of  the  jury  which 
awards  the  prizes. 

Since,  then,  with  regard  to  the  points  just  dealt  ah  parties  also 

.  .  agree  that  laws 

With  —  namely,    the    necessity    for    great    men    as  must  be  en- 
governors,  for  the  selection  of  the  fittest  of  them  a^nTpenaiSei?^ 
by  competition,  and   for  the   use  of  coercion   and 
punishment  as  a  means  of  enforcing  orders  —  there 
is  no  essential  difference  between  the  most  extreme 
democracy  and  its  opposites,  in  what  does  that  prac- 
tical or  theoretical  difference  between  them  consist, 
by  which  most   undoubtedly  the  former  is  distin- 
guished from  the  latter.?     The  only  essential  point  of 
difference  between  them  lies,  not  in  their  respective 
schemes   or  theories  of  the   machinery  of  govern- 
ment, or  of  their  methods  of  electing  governors,  but 
in  their,  theory  of  the  powers  which  election  com-  pecunrroniy^In 
municates  to  those  elected.     An  elected  governor,  JJ^uffg^Jg 
whether  chosen  from  a  larsre  or  a  small   class,  is,  greatness 

required  in 

according  to  the   aristocratic  or  oligarchic   theory,  their  governor 
chosen  because  he  is  personally  wiser  than  those  Lnd  erecXJ'e*^ 
who  elect  him ;  and  it  is  theoretically  his  mission,  ^,h^^5""f,i 
within  very  wide  limits,  to  follow  his  own  judi^ment,  enable  them  to 

■'  .       ^  carry  out  the 

not  that  of  the  electors.     The  democratic  theory  spontaneous 
is  the  very  reverse  of  this.     The  elected  governor,  many.  ° 


i8o 


ARISTOCRACY  AND   EVOLUTION 


Book  II 
Chapter  4 


This  is  the 
only  point  in 
which  the 
democratic 
theory  differs 
from  the 
aristocratic. 


according  to  that  theory,  is  elected  not  because 
he  is  supposed  to  be  wiser  than  his  constituents, 
but  because  he  is  supposed  to  be  exceptionally 
capable  of  understanding  their  precise  wishes,  and 
giving  effect  to  each  of  them.  In  the  first  of  these 
two  cases  the  governor  is  like  the  physician  whom 
the  patient  calls  in,  but  whose  orders  he  never 
thinks  of  disputing.  In  the  second,  he  is  like  the 
professional  Spanish  letter-writer,  whom  the  illiter- 
ate lover  employs  to  put  his  passion  for  him  gram- 
matically upon  paper. 

The  only  point,  then,  in  which  democracy  can 
claim  to  differ  essentially,  not  only  from  autocracy, 
but  from  any  form  of  oligarchy,  lies  not  in  its  form 
of  government,  but  in  the  power  that  is  behind  its 
government.  This  power,  according  to  democratic 
theorists,  is  the  power  of  the  mass  of  ordinary  men, 
as  definitely  opposed  to  exceptional  men ;  and  the 
exceptional  men  who  are  picked  out  as  governors 
would  necessarily,  in  an  ideal  democracy,  be  excep- 
tional only  for  such  qualities  as  practical  activity  and 
a  quick  apprehension  of  the  wishes  of  other  people, 
which  would  enable  them  to  do  what  their  many- 
headed  master  bade  them ;  but  they  would  have  to 
be  wanting  in  any  strength  of  mind  or  originality 
which  might  prompt  them  to  acts  out  of  harmony 
with  their  master's  temper  at  the  moment,  or  what 
is  the  same  thing,  to  any  acts  beyond  their  master's 
comprehension,  even  although  such  acts  might  be 
for  his  future  benefit.  This  is  what  the  democratic 
theory,  in  its  last  analysis,  means.  All  exceptional  will 


DEMO  CRA  CYAS  THE  MASTER  OF  ITS  R  ULERS    1 8 1 

is  to  be  smothered  or  over-ridden  by  the  average     Bookii 
will,  as  is  expressed  clearly  enough  in  the  well-worn 
democratic  formula  —  every  man's  vote  is  to  count 
for  one  in  government ;  no  man's  vote  is  to  count 
for  more  than  one. 

Now  this  theory  of  the  relation  of  the  great  man 
to  the  many,  so  far  as  regards  the  conduct  of  civil 
government,  is  identical  with  the  theory  which,  with 
a  much  wider  application,  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer 
enunciates  as  the  foundation  of  his  sociological 
system.  As  enunciated  by  Mr.  Spencer  we  have 
already  submitted  it  to  examination,  and  we  have 
shown  that,  in  every  practical  sense,  it  is  altogether 
fallacious,  and  that  its  acceptance  renders  all 
practical  sociology  impossible.  We  will  now  proceed 
to  show  that,  as  applied  even  to  the  most  popular 
forms  of  government,  it  is  as  false  as  it  is  when 
applied  to  social  phenomena  generally. 

That   the   essential   principle   of   democracy,    as  The  demo- 

,  ,.  1'111'fi        cratic  ruler  is, 

just  described,  accordmg  to  which  the  brain  or  the  theoretically, 
ideal  ruler  is  merely  a  balance  for  weighing  the  wills  weighki^thJ 
of  multitudes,  which  are  dropped  into  one  or  other  ^'"^  °^  '^^ 

'  A^^  many; 

of  its  scales,  like  marbles  —  that  this  principle  has 
ever  yet  been  completely  realised,  no  democrat  will 
perhaps  venture  to  maintain ;  but  the  whole  demo- 
cratic propagandism  of  the  present  day  implies, 
before  all  things  else,  that  its  complete  realisation 
is  possible,  and  that  every  day  "  the  peoples "  are 
getting  nearer  to  it.  The  facts,  however,  which  are 
supposed  to  warrant  this  conclusion  are  to  be  sought, 
not    in    the    sphere    of    official    government,   but 


l82 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  II 
Chapter  4 


or  a  machine 
for  executing 
their  "  man- 
dates " ; 


and  there  are 
signs  which 
might  suggest 
that  the  few  in 
politics  are 
really  becom- 
ing the  mere 
instruments  of 
the  many. 


without  it.  They  are  to  be  sought  not  in  the 
conduct  of  elected  legislators,  but  in  the  machinery 
by  which  they  are  elected,  and,  above  all,  in  those 
unofficial  movements,  meetings,  and  agitations  by 
which  the  prophets  of  democracy  affirm  that  the 
great  mass  of  the  people  is  learning  to  exert  the 
power  which  was  always  latent  in  it,  and  to  express 
its  will  with  regard  to  every  question  of  govern- 
ment as  it  arises,  even  if  it  has  something  yet  to 
learn  in  the  art  of  securing  that  its  governors  shall 
carry  out  its  commands.  It  is  this  view  of  the 
situation  which  is  expressed  in  the  popular  saying 
that  a  constituency  has  elected  a  member,  or  that 
the  people  has  elected  a  parliament,  with  what  is 
called  a  "  mandate  "  to  do  some  specified  thing  or 
things  —  to  break  up  the  United  Kingdom,  to 
disestablish  the  English  Church,  to  penalise  the 
drinking  of  a  glass  of  beer  on  Sundays,  or  to 
deprive  our  soldiers  of  protection  against  the  most 
malignant  of  contagious  maladies. 

Now  the  democrats,  it  must  be  admitted,  are  so 
far  right,  that  a  real  political  power  has  come  into 
existence  which  has  no  constitutional  connection 
with  the  men  who  nominally  govern ;  and  this  is 
frequently  used  with  such  efficiency,  and  with  such 
definite  purpose,  that  official  governors  —  men  of 
most  exceptional  intellect  —  are  compelled  by  it  to 
use  their  intellect  for  ends  which  they  themselves 
condemn.  Here,  then,  in  this  external  power,  is  to 
be  found,  if  it  is  to  be  found  anywhere,  the  will  of 
the  many,  as  conceived  of  by  the  theorists  of  democ- 


COMPLETE  DEMOCRACY  AN  ILLUSION     183 

racy,  exerting  itself  independently  of  any  separate      ^^"^"^  ^^ 
will  of  the  few,  and  turning  the  powers  of  the  few 
into  its  willing  or  unwilling  instruments. 

Now  perhaps  the  question  which  will  in  this  place 
most  naturally  suggest  itself  is  whether  this  will  of 
the  many,  however  effectively  it  may  be  exercised, 
is  really  a  power  that  makes  for  civilisation  and 
progress,  and  whether  it  is  not  more  likely  to  bring 
harm  than  benefit  to  those  very  collections  of  or- 
dinary men  who  exercise  it.  And  this  question  is, 
no  doubt,  extremely  pertinent ;  but  it  is  not  one  that 
need  engage  our  attention  now.  The  fact  which 
alone  we  are  now  concerned  to  demonstrate  is  that 
the  alleged  will  of  the  many  is  not  what  democrats 
conceive  it  to  be,  and  that  it  is  not  really  the  will  of 
the  many  at  all. 

For  although  there  is  much  in  the  history  of  the  But  these  signs 

,  '11       ^''^  deceptive ; 

present  century  to  warrant  the  assumption  that  the  for  wimt  seems 
political  will  of  the  many  is  at  last  emerging  as  a  I^an^  re°aiiy  ^ 
supreme    and   independent    governing    power,    we  f^t^on*{3^f°"  ^"^^ 
shall  find  that  these  movements  and  opinions,  which  another 

•  1  r     •    11  1       r  1        niinority. 

seem,  when  viewed  superficially,  to  result  from  the 
spontaneous  actions  and  spontaneous  thoughts  of 
the  man}^  really  imply  the  influence  of  exceptional 
men,  just  as  much  as  those  movements  which  are 
avowedly  aristocratic  in  origin ;  and  that  in  the 
absence  of  these  men  the  movements  could  never 
have  taken  place,  nor  the  opinions  have  ever 
assumed  any  uniform  and  coherent  shape. 

To  understand  how  this  is,  we  need  merely  reflect 
upon  the  fact  that  masses  of  men,  as  masses,  can 


1 84 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  II 
Chapter  4 

Opinions,  to 
derive  power 
from  the  num- 
bers who  hold 
them,  must  be 
identical ; 


but  they 
seldom  are 
identical  till  a 
few  men  have 
manipulated 
them. 


only  have  a  will  at  all  when  their  judgments  with 
regard  to  certain  particular  questions  happen  to  be 
absolutely  identical,  and  have  thus  a  cumulative 
force,  like  that  of  weights  piled  on  one  another 
above  some  substance  which  it  is  desired  to  com- 
press. Now,  whatever  may  be  the  thoughts,  wishes, 
or  opinions  which  spontaneously  shape  themselves  in 
the  minds  of  any  body  of  ordinary  men — men  various 
in  training  and  temperament,  and  none  of  them 
remarkable  for  wisdom  —  these  never  take  a  shape 
which  will  give  them  any  cumulative  power  unless 
amongst  the  ordinary  men  there  is  some  man  more 
active  than  the  rest,  who  weighs  them,  compares  them, 
eliminates  what  he  thinks  to  be  their  discrepancies, 
adds  what  is  in  his  opinion  necessary  to  their  logical 
completion,  and  clothes  them  in  catching  language, 
which  appeals  both  to  the  mind  and  to  the  memory. 
Not  till  this  is  done  do  the  mass  of  persons  concerned 
realise  how  identical  their  opinions  on  a  given 
question  are ;  and  they  then  perceive  them  to  be 
identical  for  an  exceedingly  simple  reason —  that  the 
exceptional  man  has  made  a  mould  for  them,  into 
which  they  have  all  been  run. 

It  is  then,  for  the  first  time,  that  the  mass  of 
ordinary  men  become  conscious  of  corporate  power; 
for  then  they  become,  with  regard  to  a  given  ques- 
tion, conscious  for  the  first  time  that  their  opinions 
are  absolutely  identical,  and  that  in  a  certain  given 
direction  their  power  is  consequently  cumulative. 
But  the  opinion  of  these  men,  whose  numbers  give 
political  force  to  it,  is  very  far  from  representing 


THE    UNANIMITY  OF  MULTITUDES  185 

the  capacities  of  these  men  only.  It  represents  (?°°^" 
the  capacities,  the  character,  and  very  probably  the 
personal  designs  of  the  exceptional  man  who  sup- 
plied that  common  mould  to  which  the  unanimity 
of  the  other  men's  opinions  is  due ;  and  the  one 
opinion  which  thus  comes  to  be  held  by  all  of  them 
will  not  be  precisely  the  opinion  that  was  originally 
held  by  any.  The  original  opinion  of  each  will 
have  undergone  some  modification.  It  will  have 
been  softened,  emphasised,  developed,  or  other 
elements  will  have  been  added  to  it,  which  would 
never  have  entered  the  mind  of  the  ordinary  man 
naturally,  and  which  even  when  admitted  he  does 
but  imperfectly  understand.     Thus  whilst  a  political  Thus  what 

.     .  ,  T    •       1     1  ^  11  seems  to  be  the 

opmion  expressed,  or  a  political  demand  made,  by  a  opinion  of  the 
body  of   ordinary  men  thus  absolutely  unanimous  ^en'erany  de- 
seems  at  first  siffht  a  genuine  expression  of  the  will  pendent  on  the 

00  r^  influence  of  a 

and  the  capacities  of  the  many,  it  always  in  part,  few. 
and  it  very  often  mainly  represents  capacities  and 
purposes  belonging  to  one  man  alone,  the  many 
being  practically  little  more  than  a  phonograph, 
which  repeats  his  words  to  the  world  through  an 
enormous  resonator. 

Let  us  take,  for  instance,  the  two  questions  of  J^^  many,  for 
Free  Trade  and  Bimetallism.  If  any  British  Govern-  never  have  had 
ment  were  to  revert  to  the  system  of  protection,  it  orrJeeTrade 
cannot  be  doubted  that  throuQ:hout  the  country  there  P/  ^'metaiiism 

0  .^  if  a  few  men 

would  be  meetings    and   demonstrations,  at  which  ^^d  not 

.  .         ,  .  worked  on 

every  throat  would  be  unanimous  in  shouting  con-  them, 
demnation  of  their  conduct.     America  has  witnessed 
a  precisely  similar  outburst  in  favor  of  a  proposal 


1 86  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Bookir     to    remonetise    silver.      The    issues    raised,   how- 

Cbapter  4  ... 

ever,  both  by  the  free  traders  and  the  bimetalHsts, 
are  of  a  kind  so  complicated  that  exceedingly  few 
people  would  be  able  even  to  describe  their  nature 
clearly  enough  to  satisfy  the  most  lenient  examiner 
who  should  set  them  a  paper  in  economics.  The 
majority  of  those  who  declared  for  bimetallism  in 
America  had  as  little  to  do  with  forming  their  own 
opinions  as  the  little  boys  would  have  in  a  pre- 
paratory school  who  should  shout  their  approval  of 
some  new  emendation  made  by  one  of  their  masters 
of  a  corrupt  passage  in  Pindar;  nor  does  that 
British  opinion  in  favour  of  free-trade  principles 
which  has  caused  our  Government  to  adopt  them, 
and  would  hinder  or  prevent  their  repudiation, 
rest  in  the  minds  of  the  majority  of  those  who 
hold  it,  on  any  larger  amount  of  original  thought 
or  knowledge.  Ninety-nine  free  traders  out  of 
a  hundred  would  never  have  been  free  traders  at 
all  if  it  had  not  been  for  the  oratory  of  Cobden. 
The  least  educated  portion  of  the  citizens  of  the 
United  States  would  never  have  howled  themselves 
hoarse  over  an  intricate  financial  problem  if  it  had 
not  been  for  the  oratory  and  the  singular  activity  of 
Mr.  Bryan.  Indeed,  what  is  oratory  itself,  which  in 
all  democracies,  from  that  of  Athens  downwards,  has 
been  essential  to  the  work  of  government,  but  an 
embodied  expression  of  the  fact  that  the  many  are 
powerless,  unless  here  and  there  some  thinker  will 
think  for  them,  and  give  them  opinions  which  may 
form  a  mould  or  a  nucleus  for  their  own }     Even  a 


DEMOCRACY  IS  DISGUISED    OLIGARCHY     187 

village  meeting  is  never  got  together  without  the  ^^^\l'^ 
agency  of  some  one  who  is  slightly  more  efficient 
than  the  rest.  He  need  not  be  wiser  than  they. 
He  very  frequently  is  not ;  but  he  has  some  gift  or 
other  which  qualifies  him  for  taking  the  lead.  His 
temperament  is  more  active,  his  words  flow  more 
freely,  or  he  is  hampered  by  less  insight  into  his 
own  ignorance  or  imbecility ;  and  his  opinions  are 
the  nucleus  round  which  those  of  the  rest  form 
themselves,  and  which  generally  imparts  to  them 
something  of  its  own  character,  as  a  vinegar  plant 
does  to  the  liquor  in  which  it  is  immersed. 

Without  some  such  nuclei  afforded  to  the  many  Popular 
by  the  few,  popular  thought  is  nebulous,  and  popular  requires  excep- 
will  unborn.     An  exceptional  few  are  essential  even  Huciei.'^oun? 
to  those  revolutionary  movements  which  have  the  J^J^JJ'^  ^°  ^^^^ 
destruction    of    the    power    of    the   few   for   their 
object.     It  is   impossible  for   the   many  to  attack 
one  set  of  superiors,  except  by  submitting  them- 
selves to  the  leadership  or  dictatorship  of  another 
set;    and   although    these    last    may   to   a   certain 
extent  represent  the  multitude,  it  is  usually  just  as 
true  that  the  multitude  represent  them.    The  multi- 
tude cannot  even   unite  to  influence  those  excep- 
tional persons  to  whom  is  entrusted  the  official  work 
of   government  without   placing  themselves  under 
the  influence  of  another  set  of  exceptional  persons ; 
and  thus  the  extremest  democracy  will  be  found,  if 
we  only  look  below  the  surface,  to  be  neither  more 
nor  less  than  an  oligarchy  disguised.     It  is,  no  doubt, 
true  that  those  who  actually  govern  do  in  a  certain 


1 88  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  II     sense  derive  their  power  from  the  many.     They  do 

Chapter  4  .  •11  • 

SO  even  in  countries  where  the  supreme  governor  is 
an  autocrat.     In  countries  with  a  popular  constitu- 
tion they  derive  their  power  from  the  many  by  an 
organised  and  conscious  system;  but  even  in  the 
extremest  democracies  the  average  men  can  exercise 
their  power  only  by  constant  processes  of  surrender- 
ing it  into  the  hands  of  exceptional  men.     They 
Thus  even  in    surrcudcr  it  iuto  the  hands  of  the  exceptional  men 
extremest        for  thc  slmplc  and  enduring  reason  that,  with  very 
feTrr?^*^^ '^^  few  exceptions,  which  will  be  examined  in  another 
essential.        placc,  it  comcs  into  existence  only  in  the  very  act  of 
surrendering  it;    and  the  many  accordingly  place 
themselves  in  the  hands  of  the  few  because,  from 
the  very  constitution  of  human  nature,  they  cannot 
avoid  doing  so. 

We  thus  see  that  even  in  that  sphere  of  political 

action  in  which,  if  anywhere,  the  many  should  be 

independent  of  the  few,  the  many  without  the  few 

would  have  no  power  at  all. 

Democrats,  The    apologists    of    dcmocracy,    however,    have 

a^gueThat"™^^  auothcr   argument  left  them.     They  may  contend 

racy^^hlTw*^    that  the  exceptional  men,  who  are  necessary  to  the 

do,  in  the  long- (^gyglQpjy^gi^t:  of  thc  collcctive   Dowcrs   of  ordinary 

run,  carry  out  •■•  ^  ■*■  _  •' 

the  genuine      mcn,  though  cach  of  them  is  constantly,  with  regard 

wishes  of  the  .        ,  .  r    11  •  1   •  i        • 

many.  to  particular  questions,  tollowing  his   own  devices 

rather  than  the  instructions  of  the  electorate,  do  on 
the  whole,  and  in  the  long-run,  substantially  carry  out 
the  intentions  and  devices  of  those  who  are  theoreti- 
cally their  masters;  and  that  though  they  may  do  what 
their  masters  could  never  have  thought  of  for  them- 


EQUALITY  OF  POWER  NON-EXISTENT      189 

selves,  yet  they  can  never  continue  to  do  anything  ^0°^  '^ 
of  which  their  masters  do  not  actually  approve. 
Now  even  were  this  representation  of  the  case  true, 
it  would  leave  untouched  that  broad  and  fundamen- 
tal truth  on  which  It  is  the  primary  purpose  of  the 
present  work  to  insist.     It  would  leave  untouched  Even  were 

111  /•    1  1      •  *his  wholly 

the  truth  that  the  great  mass  of  human  bemgs  are  true,  the  cur- 
helpless  without  the  assistance  of  a  minority  more  ordemTcra^y 
efficient   than    themselves.     If  ninety-nine  average  ^""''^  ^^  ^f^^' 

J  &     for  unequal 

men,  through  the  aid  of  a  hundredth  man  who  is  men  would  be 

111  1         •  rr  essential  to 

exceptional,  can  develop  and  give  effect  'to  a  col-  executing  the 
lective  will,  which  Is  altogether  their  own,  and  equals. 
originates  entirely  with  themselves,  but  If  they  can 
neither  develop  It  nor  give  effect  to  it  unless  the 
hundredth  man  lends  them  his  services,  the  power  of 
this  one  man  Is  as  essential  to  the  power  of  the 
ninety-nine,  as  it  would  be  if  the  orders  which  he 
executes  had  been  largely  originated  by  himself; 
just  as  a  lens  Is  essential  to  the  photographer's  cam- 
era though  its  function  Is  solely  to  focalise,  not  to 
colour,  the  rays  transmitted  by  It.  Accordingly,  even 
on  the  above  hypothesis,  the  modern  democratic 
formula,  which  makes  each  man  count  for  one,  and 
nobody  count  for  more  than  one,  would,  if  judged 
scientifically,  be  absolutely  and  fundamentally  false ; 
for  the  power  ascribed  by  it  to  the  accumulated 
faculties  of  equals  would  be  really  the  power  of 
equals  united  with  the  power  of  a  superior ;  and  the 
difference  between  the  equals  and  the  superior 
would  be  at  once  apparent  from  this  —  that  if  one  of 
the  equals  were  subtracted,  the  power  of  the  whole 


190  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  II      hundred  would  be  diminished  by  one  ninety-ninth 

Chapter  4  .  .  -'  -^  . 

only;  but  if  the  one  superior  were  subtracted,  it 
would  collapse  altogether.  Thus  the  presence  of 
the  superior,  and  the  terms  on  which  his  services 
can  be  secured,  would  even  in  this  case  be  sub- 
jects on  which  the  sociologist  would  be  bound  to 
bestow  the  same  attention  as  he  bestows  at  present 
on  the  activities  of  the  ordinary  men ;  and  unless 
he  should  do  this,  his  conclusions  would  be  wholly 
valueless. 
Now  in  reality      As  a  matter  of  fact,  however,  the  hypothesis  that 

the  few  are  ,  .  -  , 

never  mere      the  supcnor  lew  are  ever  the  mere  passive  agents 
passive  agents;  ^j^j^,]^  ^]^g  dcmocratic  thcory  assumes  them  to  be  is 

false  ;  and  it  is  as  a  rule  false  in  exact  proportion  to 
the  difficulty  and  importance  of  the  cases  to  which 
it  is  applied.  The  qualities  which  enable  men  to 
organise  the  opinions  of  others  are  usually  qualities 
which  endow  them  with  strong  opinions  of  their 
own ;  and  in  addition  to  their  own  opinions,  these 
men,  with  their  exceptional  vigour,  have  usually 
their  own  purposes  also ;  and  the  popular  will,  as  put 
into  execution  by  them,  is  always  modified,  and  very 
often  metamorphosed,  by  what  they  themselves  add 
to  or  subtract  from  it.  Still  it  must  be  admitted 
that,  in  spite  of  their  dependence  on  the  few,  the 
many  can,  and  do  to  a  great  extent,  impress  their  own 
but  neverthe-  gcnuinc  will  —  the  will  and  wishes  of  the  average 
dTimprSr^  man  as  distinct  from  the  will  and  wishes  of  the  man 
their  will  on     vyho  is  in  any  way  exceptional  —  on  the  exceptional 

them  to  a  great  j  j  r  r 

extent.  mgn  to  whom  their  power  is  surrendered.    The  acts 

of  the  governing  few  may  never  entirely  represent 


EXTENT  OF  THE  POWER    OF  THE  MANY     191 
the  will  and  wishes  of  the  averaoje  man,  when  these     '^^''\  " 

«->  Chapter  4 

acts  are  considered  as  a  whole;  but  they  may  be 
forced  to  embody,  and  they  generally  do  embody,  a 
certain  element  of  what  average  men  wish  and  will ; 
and  their  character  as  a  whole  is  profoundly  modi- 
fied in  consequence.  The  question  then  is  simply  a 
question  of  degree.     What  is  the  extent  —  or  rather  The  question  is 

^  *-*  f     1  •  •        to  wAa/ extent  ? 

what  IS  the  utmost  possible  extent  —  of  this  genuine 
power  of  the  many  to  make  the  faculties  of  the 
exceptional  few  their  servants.?  Is  it  great  or 
small } 

The  reader  will  perceive  that  when  this  question  This  intro- 

,       ,  .  •  .  1       1 1        i    1  •  duces  us  to  a 

is  asked  our  inquiry  is  gradually  taking  a  new  new  side  of  the 
turn,  and  that  having  started  with  asserting  the  eiS'm  of"*^" 
claims  of  the  great  man  as  the  author  and  sustainer  *|^^  p°^^"  °^ 

o  ^  the  many. 

of  both  intellectual  and  economic  progress,  we  are 
led,  when  we  come  to  consider  him  as  an  agent  in 
the  domain  of  politics,  to  inquire  into  what  is  done 
by  the  average  man,  as  well  as  into  what  is  done  by 
him.     And  the  reason  for  this  is  that  in  the  domain  This  is  greater 

.  in  politics  than 

of  politics  the  many,  so  far  as  direct  and  intentional  in  industry; 
influence  is  concerned,  are  actually  capable  of  playing 
a  far  larger  part  than  they  are  in  the  domain  of 
speculation  or  of  advanced  economic  production. 
A  statesman  like  Mr.  Gladstone  might,  without 
absurdity,  maintain  that  he  had  a  mandate  from  the 
many  to  grant  home-rule  to  Ireland;  but  nobody 
could  pretend  that  any  body  of  mechanics  had  given 
Watt  a  mandate  to  invent  the  steam-engine,  or 
that  any  one  gave  Newton  a  mandate  to  discover 
the  law  of  gravitation.     And  yet  the  reflection  will 


192  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  II  probably  force  itself  upon  every  reader  that  if  the 
many  play  a  part  in  politics  which  is  commensurate 
with  that  of  the  few,  they  play  a  part  in  intellectual 
and  economic  progress  also.  It  would  be  useless  for 
the  few  to  unfold  their  thoughts  and  their  discov- 
and  yet  when  eHes  to  the  many,  if  the  many  were  not,  in  various 
over  w"e  shall  dcgrccs,  Capable  of  assimilating  and  responding  to 
greaunmost  them.  Still  Icss  could  the  great  man  of  industry 
domains  of  realisc  his  progressive  inventions,  or  carry  out  his 
extending  schemes  of  business,  if  it  were  not  that 
an  indefinite  number  of  ordinary  men  —  those 
"serviceable  animals,"  as  Mr.  John  Morley  calls 
them  —  were  endowed  with  capacities  that  enabled 
them  to  carry  out  his  bidding.  What  would 
Mahomet  have  done  if  he  had  not  had  followers  ? 
What  would  Columbus  have  done  if  he  had  not  had 
seamen.''  The  reader,  accordingly,  will  inevitably 
be  led  to  urge  that  in  attributing  to  the  great  men 
of  the  world  the  results  which  we  have  attributed  to 
them,  our  statements  are  unmeaning,  unless  they  are 
accepted  as  incomplete,  and  are  understood  to  imply 
more  than  they  have  actually  expressed.  If  no 
progress  of  any  kind  could  have  taken  place  without 
the  many,  surely,  it  will  be  argued,  the  many  must 
have  had  some  share  in  producing  it ;  and  unless 
we  can  assert  and  discriminate  precisely  what  this 
share  is  —  what  are  the  phenomena  of  progress 
which  are  due  to  the  activity  of  ordinary  men  —  it 
is  meaningless  to  assert  that  most  of  them  are  due 
to  the  activity  of  exceptional  men. 

And  the  larger  part  of  this  argument  is  perfectly 


examine  it. 


THE   TWO    CO-ORDINATE  POWERS  193 

true.     In  dealing  with  the  activities  of  the  few,  we     ^^^"^ " 

.         Chapter  4 

have  taken  those  of  the  many  for  granted.     This 
general  assumption,  however,  though  inevitable  at  ^^<^  '^^^  <o 
the  beginning  of  our  inquiry,  has  been  provisional  granted  at 
only.     To  any  scientific  conception  of  what  is  done  must "/ow 
exclusively  by  the   few,  an    equally  scientific   con- 
ception of  what  is  done  by  the  many  is  essential. 
We  must  measure  the  former  by  the  latter,  as  we 
measure  mountains  by  their  respective  heights  above 
the  sea-level.     That  such  a  discrimination  between 
the  work  of  these  two  bodies  is  possible  may  be 
doubted  by  some ;  and  accordingly  before  we  actually 
proceed  to  undertake  it,   we   will   dispose   of   the 
arguments  that  will   be,  and   actually  have   been, 
advanced  in  proof  of  its  impracticability,  and  set  forth 
the  principles  on  which  it  must  be,  and  obviously 
can  be,  made. 
13 


BOOK   III 


CHAPTER   I 

HOW  TO  DISCRIMINATE  BETWEEN  THE  PARTS  CON- 
TRIBUTED TO  A  JOINT  PRODUCT  BY  THE  FEW 
AND    BY    THE    MANY 

In  the  first  chapter  of  his  Principles  of  Political '^^^^^^'^^^''^^ 

'■  .  .        .      .       that  when  two 

Economy   Mill   alludes   to  the    question    raised    by  agencies  are 
certain    thinkers,    of    "  whether  stature  gives   more  producing  an 
assistance  to  labour  in  one  kind  of  industry  than  ^ Jp'g'ct^e'^ 
another " ;   and  he    endeavours    to    show   that   the  contributions 

to  It  cannot  be 

question  is  useless  and  unanswerable.  In  every  discriminated, 
industry,  he  says,  there  would  be  no  product  at  all 
unless  nature  gave  something  and  labour  did  some- 
thing. Each  is  ''■absolutely  indispensable^'  and  the 
part  played  by  each  is  consequently  "  indefinite 
and  inco7nmenstirabler  "  When  two  conditions^''  he 
proceeds,  "  are  eqtially  necessary  for  producing  the 
effect  at  all,  it  is  unmeaning  to  say  that  so  fnuch  of 
it  is  produced  by  one,  and  so  much  by  the  other ; 
it  is  like  attempting  to  decide  which  half  of  a  pair 
of  scissors  has  most  to  do  in  the  act  of  cutti^ig,  or 
which  of  the  factors  five  and  six  contributes  most 
to  the  production  of  thirty!'  If  this  argument  is 
applicable   to   nature  and  labour  as  agents  in  the 

197 


198 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  III 
Chapter  i 


Mill  argues 
thus  with 
special  refer- 
ence to  land 
and  labour ; 


but  he  over- 
looks what  in 
actual  life  is 
the  main  feat- 
ure in  the 
case. 


The  labour 
remaining  the 
same,  the  prod- 
uct varies 
with  the  quality 
of  the  land. 


production  of  commodities,  it  is  equally  applicable 
to  the  few  and  the  many  as  agents  in  the  production 
of  social  progress  generally ;  and  the  crisp  phrases 
and  illustrations  which  Mill  employs  in  formulating 
it,  put  in  the  clearest  and  most  forcible  manner 
possible  the  whole  class  of  objections  referred  to  at 
the  close  of  the  last  Book. 

Mill  brings  the  argument  forward  with  special 
reference  to  agriculture.  Let  us  take,  he  says  in 
effect,  the  products  of  any  farm ;  and  it  is  obviously 
absurd  to  inquire  which  produces  most  of  it  —  the 
fields  or  the  farm  labourers.  Now  if  all  labour  were 
equal,  and  if  there  were  only  one  farm  in  the  world, 
or  if  every  acre  of  land,  when  the  same  labour  was 
applied  to  it,  yielded  the  same  amount  of  produce, 
this  would,  no  doubt,  be  true.  The  actual  state  of 
the  case  is,  however,  widely  different.  Acres  vary 
very  greatly  in  fertility ;  and  if  the  produce  of  one  — 
the  least  fertile  —  when  cultivated  by  a  given  amount 
of  labour,  be  symbolised  by  ten  loaves,  the  produce 
of  others,  when  cultivated  by  the  same  labour,  will 
be  symbolised  by  loaves  to  the  number  of  twelve, 
fifteen,  or  twenty.  Here,  then,  we  have  a  constant 
quantity  of  labour,  which  produces  ten  loaves  from 
each  of  the  four  acres  in  question ;  but  when 
applied  to  the  first,  it  produces  ten  loaves  only; 
when  applied  to  the  three  others,  it  produces  two, 
or  five,  or  ten  loaves  in  addition.  About  the  first 
ten  loaves,  in  each  case,  it  is  not  possible  to  argue. 
So  far  as  they  are  concerned,  the  result  is  in  each 
case  the   same ;   with   regard  to  them  we   cannot 


LAND  AND  LABOUR  199 

make  any  comparison;  and  we  must  admit  that  the  Book  in 
parts  played  by  land  and  labour  in  producing  them 
are  " indefinite  and  incommensurable"  precisely  as 
Mill  says  they  are.  But  the  two,  the  five,  or  the 
ten  extra  loaves  which  result  when  labour  is  ap- 
plied to  the  second,  the  third,  and  the  fourth  acre 
respectively,  but  do  not  result  at  all  so  long  as  it  is 
applied  only  to  the  first,  constitute  phenomena  of  a 
different  order  altogether.  The  labour  being  in 
each  of  the  four  cases  the  same,  and  these  additional 
loaves  resulting  in  three  cases  only,  these  additional 
loaves  are  obviously  not  due  to  labour,  but  to  certain 
additional  qualities  present  in  the  last  three  acres 
and  not  present  in  the  first.     In  other  words,  though  The  extra  prod- 

.  ,        .  ,11  n/TMi  •  7     uct  resulting 

m   producmg  the  loaves,  or,  as  Mill  puts  it,  " ///^  from  labour 
effecC  the  parts   played  respectively  by  land   and  J^ndTdlS^to 
labour  are  incommensurable  so  lono^  as  the  land,  *^^,  '^"'^' "°' 

o  '  to  labour. 

the  labour,  and  the  effect  remain  the  same,  the  parts 
become  immediately  mensurable  as  soon  as  the 
effect  begins  to  vary,  and  one  of  the  causes,  and  one 
of  the  causes  only,  varies  also. 

This    truth    can   be    yet  further   elucidated   by  this  is  easily 
means  of  Mill's  two  other  illustrations.     If  the  two  number  of 
blades   of   a   pair   of    scissors  were   made  of    two  musn-Sns. 
different  materials,  and  the  one  blade  were  of  such 
a  nature  that  it  was  always  of  the  same  quality,  and 
human  ingenuity  was  not  capable  of  improving  it, 
whilst  the  qualities  of  the  other  blade  varied  with 
the  skill  devoted  to  its  manufacture,  and  if  one  pair 
of   scissors  should  cut  twenty  yards  of  cloth  in  a 
minute,  whilst  another  cut  only  ten,  the  additional 


200  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  III     efficiency  of   the   more   efficient   pair  would,  it   is 

Chapter  i  ....  ,,  iiii- 

perfectly  obvious,  be  due  to  that  blade  in  respect 
of  which  this  pair  differed  from  the  pair  which  was 
less  efficient,  not  to  the  blade  in  respect  of  which 
both  pairs  were  similar.  Again,  let  us  take  Mill's 
case  of  the  two  numerals  five  and  six.  If  five  is 
always  to  be  the  number  multiplied,  and  six  is 
always  to  be  the  multiplier,  it  is  true  we  cannot  say 
which  does  most  in  producing  the  result  —  thirty. 
But  if  the  number  to  be  multiplied  remains  always 
five,  whilst  the  multiplying  number  varies,  if  it  is  in 
one  case  six  and  in  another  case  ten,  and  if  the  result 
of  the  multiplication  in  the  second  case  is  not  thirty 
but  fifty,  it  is  obvious  that  the  additional  twenty 
which  results  from  our  multiplying  by  ten  is  due 
not  to  any  change  in  the  number  multiplied,  but  to 
the  additional  four  introduced  into  the  number 
multiplying.  To  these  illustrations  we  may  add  two 
others  —  the  movement  of  a  modern  bicycle  and  the 
movement  of  a  man  running.  A  modern  bicycle 
cannot  be  propelled  without  a  chain ;  and  if  there 
were  only  one  kind  of  bicycle  in  the  world.  Mill 
might  fairly  have  said  that  it  was  meaningless 
and  useless  to  ask  whether  the  wheels  or  the  chain 
contributed  most  to  its  velocity.  But  if  there  are 
two  bicycles,  with  precisely  similar  wheels,  but  with 
dissimilar  chains,  and  if  the  same  man  riding  on  one 
can  accomplish  ten  miles  an  hour  only,  but  on  the 
other  fifteen,  the  common  sense  of  every  bicycle 
rider  in  the  world  will  tell  him  that  the  additional 
five  miles  are  contributed  entirely  by  the  chain,  and 


ERROR    OF  MILLS  ARGUMENT  201 

the  patentees   of  the   chain,  we   may   be   certain,     Book  111 

^  .  .  ■'  Chapter  i 

will  add  their  valuable  testimony  to  the  fact.  So 
with  regard  to  running,  Mill  might  fairly  have  said 
that  if  we  consider  it  in  an  abstract  and  general 
sense,  it  is  absurd  to  ask  which  contributes  most  to 
''  the  effect''  —  the  ground  or  the  man  that  runs  on 
it,  because  the  first  is  as  indispensable  to  the  man's 
movement  as  is  the  second.  But  if  two  men  are 
racing  each  other  over  the  same  course,  and  one 
runs  a  mile  whilst  the  other  runs  only  half,  it  is 
perfectly  obvious  that  the  extra  speed  of  the  winner 
is  contributed  not  by  the  ground,  which  for  both 
men  is  just  the  same,  but  by  certain  qualities  in  the 
winner  which  the  loser  does  not  possess,  or  which 
the  winner  possesses  in  larger  measure  than  he. 

Now  in  all  questions  connected  with  progressive  mhi  errs  by 
social  action  the  effects  which  have  to  be  considered  changilfg*  ^ 
are  not  general  effects,  such  as  running  at  some  '^'^^'^'^"^•^'^  ^^ 
indeterminate  speed,  each  of  which  effects  is  con- 
sidered as  being  single  of  its  kind,  and  which,  in 
consequence,  cannot  be  compared  with  anything, 
but  effects  each  kind  of  which  exhibits  many  com- 
parable varieties,  such  as  the  running  of  several 
men  whose  respective  speeds  are  different.  The 
whole  error  of  Mill's  argument  depends  on  his 
failure  to  perceive  this.  He  describes  the  result 
of  man's  labour  applied  to  land  —  a  result  which 
we  have  for  convenience'  sake  expressed  in  terms 
of  loaves  as  "  the  effect."  He  says  "  nature  and 
labour  are  equally  necessary  for  producing  the  effect 
at  air,'  as  though  the  same  amount  of  land  and 


langing 

laracter 

the  effect. 


202  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  III  labour  must  always  result  in  the  production  of  the 
same  number  of  loaves.  To  conceive  and  speak 
of  the  matter  in  this  way  is  to  ignore  entirely  all 
the  phenomena  of  progress  —  all  the  phenomena 
which  differentiate  civilisation  from  savagery,  and 
which  it  is  the  special  function  of  economics  and 
of  sociology  to  explain.  Rent,  for  example,  the 
theory  of  which  Mill  states  with  extreme  lucidity, 
and  insists  upon  with  the  utmost  emphasis,  arises 
from  the  fact  that  one  man  and  one  acre  of  land, 
The  case  of     instead  of  producing:  something;  that  can  be  described 

labour  directed  ^  7  rr  T  '        ^•  rr 

by  different  generally  as  "  the  effect,  produce  m  different  cases 
fhTsamras^  effccts  that  are  widely  different  —  ten  loaves  when 
labouTlppiied  ^^^  ^^^^  ^s  ^^^'  twenty  loaves  when  the  acre  is  good : 
to  different      ^ud,  iw  a  similar  way,  when  the  acres  are  of  the 

qualities  of  ,  •'  . 

land.  The  samc  quality,  twenty  loaves  will  be  produced  by  an 
du?e  the^hi-^°  acre  if  it  is  cultivated  by  the  methods  of  civilisation, 
crement.        ^^^  ^^^^  ^^^  j^^  ^^  ^^^^  j£  j^  jg  cultivated  by  the 

methods  of  a  savage.  Now,  just  as  agricultural  rent 
arises  from  different  qualities  in  the  soil,  so  does 
agricultural  progress  arise  from  differences  in  the 
powers  of  the  men.  It  is  measured  by,  and  it  consists 
of,  not  "  the  effect,"  but  a  series  of  effects,  similar 
indeed  in  kind,  but  continually  increasing  in  de- 
gree ;  and  it  is  their  differences  in  degree,  not  their 
similarity  in  kind,  that  form  for  the  economist  the 
particular  subject  to  be  considered. 

And  what  is  true  in  this  respect  of  production 
and  progress  in  agriculture  is  equally  true  of  pro- 
duction and  progress  generally.  The  former  indeed 
are  the  simplest  type  of  the  latter,  just  as  they  are 


THE  PRODUCT  OF  LABOUR  ALONE         203 
their  orio^inal  basis ;  and  before  we  proceed  farther,     ^ook  in 

,    ■»  '  .  .   ■'^         .  '       Chapter  i 

there  is  one  fact  more  in  connection  with  them  on 

which  it  is  necessary  for  the  purposes  of  our  present  Labour,  how- 

■^  ever,  must  be 

argument  to  msist.  Of  soils  the  same  as  to  area,  held  to  pro- 
but  not  the  same  as  to  quality,  some,  it  has  been  Jntmum 
said,  will  produce  ten  loaves,  some  fifteen,  some  "upportThl" 
twenty ;  and  soils  may  exist,  perhaps,  which  would  labourers 
produce  only  five.  But  in  order  that  any  soil  may 
be  cultivated  by  human  labour,  it  is  necessary  that 
the  product  should  be  at  least  sufficient  to  keep  the 
men  alive  who  devote  their  labour  to  cultivating  it. 
No  set  of  men,  unless  artificially  subsidised,  could 
continue  to  cultivate  any  region  if  the  product  of 
twelve  months'  labour  would  support  them  for  only 
three  months.  It  follows,  therefore,  from  this 
truism  that  no  soils  can  be  cultivated  which  will 
not  yield  to  labour  a  certain  minimum  product. 
Now,  though  this  minimum  is,  in  a  certain  sense, 
the  product  of  labour  and  of  land  jointly,  for  all 
purposes  of  practical  reasoning  it  is  the  product  of 
labour  alone.  It  is  so  because  the  sole  object  of 
practical  reasoning  about  the  matter  is  to  determine 
the  principles  on  which  the  product  of  the  land  is 
to  be  distributed ;  and  with  regard  to  that  minimum 
there  can  be  no  doubt  or  question.  It  must  go  to 
the  labourer,  and  it  can  go  to  no  one  else.  The 
landlord,  if  there  be  one,  cannot  take  any  part  of 
it ;  for  if  he  did,  the  labourer  would  die,  and  there 
would  cease  to  be  any  product  to  take.  Labour,  both  in  agri- 
then,  in  agriculture  must  be  held  for  all  practical 
purposes  to  produce  the  whole  of   that  minimum 


«04  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  III  resulting  from  its  application  to  the  least  productive 
soils  which  the  labourer  can  live  by  cultivating ; 
and  it  is  only  in  the  case  of  soils  which  are  more 
productive  than  these,  and  which  yield  to  similar 
labour  a  product  above  this  minimum,  that  land, 
apart  from  labour,  can  be  said  practically  to  produce 
anything  at  all. 
and  in  all  kinds      Now  just  as  wc  Can  argue  with  regard  to  land 

of  production.  •*  . 

and  labour,  so  can  we  argue  with  regard   to  the 

average  men  and  the  great  men,  and  measure  what 

they  contribute  respectively  to  any  given  civilisation ; 

for  just  as  a  thousand  men  from  some  good  soil  will 

elicit  twice  the  produce  they  would  be  able  to  elicit 

from  a  bad  soil,  so  from  a  bad  soil  may  a  thousand 

average  men  manage  to  elicit,  if  directed  by  some 

agricultural  genius,  twice  the  product  which  they 

would  elicit  if  left  to  themselves;  and   just  as  in 

the  former  case,  according  to  the  principles  above 

stated,  we  shall  ascribe  the  smaller  product  to  labour 

without  any  reference  to  land,  and  ascribe  to  land 

the   excess   only   of   the   larger  product   over   the 

smaller,   so   in   the    second   shall   we   ascribe   the 

smaller  product  to  the  average  men,  and  the  excess 

of  the  larger  product  over  the  smaller  to  the  great 

The  great  man  man.     Wc  shall  Say,  in  fact,  that  the  sfreat  man  pro- 
produces  the  1      r    1  1  11     • 
increment  that  Quccs  SO  much  oi  thc  product  as  comcs  anuually  mto 

produced  by    cxistcncc  whcn  hc  directs  the  others,  and  disappears 

influenie^'^     as  soon  as  hc  ceases  to  direct  them. 

ceased.  Hcrc,   howcvcr,    the   original    objection    of    Mill 

will  suggest  itself  again,  though  in  a  somewhat 
different  form ;  for  in  spite   of   all    that  has  been 


A  PLAUSIBLE  FALLACY  205 

said,  it  still  remains  certain  that  the  great  man  could     ^°°^  "^ 

,  ,  Chapter  i 

not  produce    this   excess   unless  the  average   men 

were  present  to  carry  out  his  directions ;    and  the  Labour,  it  is 

1  Ml  M  1       1  T  1  11        true,  is  essen- 

reader  will  possibly  be  disposed  to  argue  that  the  tiai  to  the  pro- 

1  11  T,      1         •  ,^     duction  of  the 

average  men  may  be  as  reasonably  credited  with  increment 
the  whole  of  the  product,  except  that  insignificant  ^^^°' 
fraction  which  the  great  man  could  have  produced 
without   them,  as  the  great  man  may  be  credited 
with  the  whole  of  the  product  except  that  which 
the  average  men  could  have  produced  without  him. 

Now    this     reasoning    has    a    certain     fanciful  ^ut  we  cannot 

1  -1   -I-  1  ••11  1  1  '1  r  draw  any  con- 

plausibility,  but  it  is  absolutely  devoid  of  any  elusions  from 
practical  meaning ;  and  in  order  to  show  the  of^iaboS  ceas- 
reader  how  and  why  it  is  so,  it  will  be  necessary'"^' 
to  direct  his  attention  to  a  certain  fact  which  lies 
at  the  bottom  of  all  practical  reasoning,  but  which 
few  practical  reasoners  ever  consciously  realise. 
All  such  reasoning  is  in  its  nature  hypothetical, 
and  can  be  reduced  to  a  statement  that  if  such 
conditions  are  present,  such  consequences  will 
result;  and  that  if  existing  conditions  be  altered 
in  any  specified  way,  the  results  will  exhibit  a 
specified  and  corresponding  difference.  If,  however, 
this  reasoning  is  to  have  any  practical  value,  one 
thing  is  essential  to  it  —  namely,  that  the  supposed 
alterations  shall  be  at  least  approximately  possible. 
No  practical  conclusion,  for  instance,  could  possibly 
be  drawn  as  to  machinery  by  considering  what 
would  happen  if  the  properties  of  the  circle  were 
to  be  changed,  and  different  parts  of  the  circum- 
ference  should  be  at  different  distances  from  the 


206 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  III 
Chapter  i 

for  the 
labourers 
would  have  to 
labour  whether 
the  great  men 
were  there  or 
no. 


The  cessation 
of  the  great 
man's  influ- 
ence is  a  practi- 
cal alternative ; 
the  cessation 
of  labour 
is  not; 


as  we  see  by 

frequent 

examples. 


centre.  It  is  equally  evident  that  no  practical 
conclusion  as  to  the  claims  and  prospects  of  labour 
could  be  drawn  by  considering  what  would  happen 
if  the  labourers  could  live  without  food.  Now  since 
no  food  is  producible  without  labour,  a  population 
which  does  not  labour  is  just  as  impossible  a  con- 
ception as  a  population  which  does  not  require  to 
eat ;  and  no  practical  conclusions  can  be  arrived  at 
by  supposing  it  to  exist ;  but  populations  which  have 
developed  and  submitted  themselves  to  no  great 
men,  not  only  can  exist,  but  have  existed,  and  do 
exist  to-day;  and  thus  we  are  reasoning  in  a 
strictly  practical  way  when  we  consider  what  would 
be  produced  by  the  average  men  if  the  great  man 
ceased  to  direct  them,  but  we  are  reasoning  to  no 
practical  purpose  at  all  by  considering  what  would 
happen  if  the  average  men  ceased  to  labour.  The 
latter  —  or  the  majority  of  them  —  would  have  to 
labour  in  any  case,  whether  there  were  any  great  man 
to  direct  their  labour  or  no;  and  the  supposition 
of  their  labouring  is  bound  up  with  the  supposition 
of  their  existence.  The  sole  practical  alternatives 
which  can  in  the  present  case  be  conceived  and 
reasoned  from  are  average  men  labouring  under  the 
direction  of  the  great  man's  talents,  or  the  same  men 
labouring  blindly  as  best  they  can  by  themselves. 

These  alternatives  are  being  constantly  exempli- 
fied in  the  actual  life  of  communities.  We  may  see 
men  to-day,  not  only  amongst  savages,  but  amongst 
the  peasantries  of  civilised  countries,  such  as  Russia, 
India,  and  parts  of  Ireland  and  the  Scottish  islands, 


GREAT  MEN  AND   THE  INCREMENT       207 

who  are  still  almost  independent  of  any  intellect  ^"^  "^ 
superior  to  their  own,  and  who  maintain  themselves 
by  the  exertion  of  man's  commonest  faculties  only. 
We  may  see  again  populations  who  have  been  in  the 
same  condition,  but  who,  under  great  men's  guidance, 
become  agents  in  producing  a  civilisation  which  they 
could  by  themselves  not  only  not  produce,  but  could, 
by  themselves,  hardly  even  imagine ;  and  again  we 
may  see  how  in  more  than  one  country  the  energies 
of  the  great  man,  having  worked  these  wonders  for 
a  time,  become  paralysed  by  insecurity  under  a 
barbarous  and  predatory  despotism,  and  how,  as 
his  action  ceases,  the  masses  relapse  again  into 
their  former  condition  of  relative  inefficiency. 

Accordingly,  though  the  productivity  of  the 
average  men,  as  distinct  from  the  great  men,  will 
be  different  in  one  race  or  region  from  what  it  is 
in  another,  just  as  their  diet  will  be  and  the  other 
necessaries  of  existence,  yet  within  each  community 
experience  furnishes  us  with  comparisons  which  show 
us,  roughly  at  all  events,  how  much  the  average 
men  produce  without  the  aid  of  the  great  men,  and 
how  much  the  great  men,  by  directing  the  average 
men,   add    to   this.^     To   calculate   these   amounts 

*  It  is,  of  course,  true  that  in  densely  populated  countries  and 
in  certain  industries  the  average  workmen,  if  left  to  themselves 
suddenly,  with  no  man  of  business  ability  to  guide  them,  would  be 
unable  to  produce  anything.  But  so  long  as  the  man  of  exceptional 
talent  employs  them  to  produce  anything,  they  contribute  something 
to  the  result,  and  must,  for  practical  purposes,  be  held  to  produce  so 
much  of  it  as  will  provide  them  with  the  means  of  living.  If  it 
happens,  as  is  sometimes  the  case,  that  the  total  value  of  the  profit 


2o8  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  III     -vvrith  any  approach  to  exactness  will,  no  doubt,  be 

Chapter  I  ^.i^     \^    .  ,  ,  .  . 

more  dimcult  in  some  cases  than  others,  just  as  is 
the  case  with  book-keeping  in  various  businesses. 
But  it  is  enough  to  have  shown    the  reader  that, 
despite    Mill's  contention  to  the  contrary,  the  cal- 
culation   is   one  which    is   based    on   the   simplest 
Thus  the  great  and  most  iudisputablc  principles,  and  that  not  only 
most  practical  in  a  thcorctical,  but  in  the  most  strictly  practical 
du"c«'Sh°at      sense,   what    great    men   produce,    when    they   co- 
labour  would    operate  with    average   men   by   directino^  them,  is 

not  produce  in      ^^  .  . 

his  absence,  the  amouut  or  dcgrcc  in  which  the  total  result  pro- 
duced exceeds  or  excels  that  which  was  produced 
by  average  men  when  unaided,  and  would  be  again 
produced  by  them  were  the  great  man's  aid  with- 
drawn. 

An  analysis  of       fhc   absolutc  Validity  of   this  method  of   argu- 

practical  ••111 

reasoning  as  to  ment  and  calculatiou  Will  be  yet  more  apparent 
auywiifshow  to  the  rcadcr  when  we  pursue  a  step  farther 
our  analysis  of  reasoning  generally  as  applied 
to  practical  matters,  and  consider  it  especially 
when  it  takes  the  form  of  a  direct  discussion 
with  regard  to  causes  and  effects.  In  the  strictest 
sense  of  the  word  it  would  plainly  be  quite  im- 
possible to  specify  fully  the  causes  of  even  effects 
of  the  simplest  kind.  The  motion,  for  instance,  of 
a  ball  when  a  cricketer  hits  it,  would,  in  any  dis- 
cussion of  the  game,  be  said  to  have  been  caused  by 

is  less  than  the  workmen's  wages,  the  employer  must  either  alter  the 
character  of  his  product,  so  as  to  meet  the  public  demand,  or  he  will 
otherwise  be  crushed  out  of  existence  as  an  employer,  and  his  work- 
men will  pass  under  the  control  of  some  more  able  rival. 


us  the  truth  of 
this. 


CAUSES  IN  PRACTICAL  REASONING        209 

the  cricketer ;  but  the  entire  antecedents  and  con-     ^'^°^  "^ 
ditions  which   have   rendered   this   effect   possible 
comprise  not  only  all  the  incidents  of  the  cricketer's 
past  training,  but  the  history  of  cricket  itself,  and 
half  the  properties  of  matter.    It  would  be  impossible 
and  useless  to  specify  all  these.     When  we  say  that 
anything  is  the  cause  of  anything  else,  we  are  always 
selecting  that  cause  out  of  an  indefinite  number,  on 
which,  for   the  purpose  on  hand,  it  is  practically 
important  that  we  should  insist ;  and  the  cause  on 
which   it   is    important    that  we    should    insist  for  For  practical 
practical  purposes  will  be  found  to  be  always  one  cause  of  an 
which,  under  the   circumstances   in   view,  may   or  ^fus^  o^Ij,^* 
may  not  be  present,^  —  which  a  careless  person  may  "^^'^^  '"f.y  °' 

J  i-  '  i-  J   may  not  be 

neglect   to    introduce,    or   an   ignorant   person   be  present; 
persuaded  to  take  away ;  whilst  those  other  causes 
whose  presence  is  assumed  by  all  parties  to  the  dis- 

^  It  was  his  complete  neglect  of  these  considerations  that  enabled 
Karl  Marx  to  impose  on  himself  and  others  his  doctrine  that  the 
value  of  commodities  depended  on  the  amount  of  average  labour 
embodied  in  them  —  a  doctrine  which  is  the  most  remarkable  in- 
tellectual mare's  nest  of  the  century.  It  is  perfectly  true  that  if  all 
other  circumstances  were  always  equal  —  the  demand  for  the  com- 
modities in  question,  the  ability  with  which  average  labour  is 
directed,  and  the  assistance  which  the  genius  of  the  great  inventors 
gives  to  it  —  it  is  perfectly  true  that  then  the  amount  of  average  labour 
embodied  in  various  commodities  would  be  the  measure  of  their 
value ;  for  labour  in  that  case  would  be  the  only  variant.  But,  in 
reality,  the  important  variants  are  not  average  labour,  but  the  ability 
by  which  labour  is  directed.  The  efficiency  of  labour  itself  is 
practically  constant ;  and  for  the  student  of  wealth-production  the 
principal  force  to  be  studied  is  the  ability  of  the  few,  by  which  the 
labour  of  the  many  is  multiplied,  and  which  only  exerts  itself  under 
special  social  circumstances. 
14 


2IO  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  III  cussion,  and  which  no  one  proposes  to  take  away, 
or  which  no  one  is  able  to  take  away,  or  whose 
number,  if  they  were  mentioned,  would  make  all 
discussion  impossible,  are  passed  over  in  silence, 
for  there  is  no  need  to  mention  them.  Thus  we 
as  we  see        all  know  that  when  a  house  is  burnt  to  the  ground 

when  men  ,  r        i  i  •  i 

discuss  the  thc  causcs  01  the  phenomenon  comprise  the 
cause  of  a  fire,  j^iflammable  nature  of  timber,  and  indeed  the 
whole  chemistry  of  combustion  ;  but  if  an  insurance 
office  is  disputing  the  owner's  claim  to  compensation 
on  the  ground  that  the  owner  set  a  light  to  it  pur- 
posely, whilst  the  owner  maintains  that  the  scullery- 
maid  set  it  alight  by  accident  whilst  reading  in  bed 
a  novel  of  Belgravian  life,  the  only  causes  that  will 
be  put  forward  by  the  litigants  will,  let  us  say,  be 
a  candle  alleged  by  the  owner  to  have  ignited  the 
scullery-maid's  pillow-case  accidentally,  and  on  the 
other  hand  a  match  which  is  alleged  by  the  agent  of 
the  insurance  office  to  have  been  applied  by  the  owner 
to  the  drawing-room  curtains  intentionally.  Or 
again,  let  us  take  the  case  of  a  ship's  chronometer, 
or  of  the         Xhc  reliability  of  a  chronometer,  any  practical  man 

accuracy  of  a         _  ,  . 

chronometer,  will  tell  US  if  wc  ask  him  about  the  matter,  depends 
on  the  balance  and  the  escapement.  It  is  the  perfect 
"  compensation  "  of  the  latter  and  what  is  called  the 
"  detachment "  of  the  former  that  differentiates  the 
chronometer  from  the  ordinary  lever  watch ;  and 
these  are  rightly  said  to  be  the  causes  of  the 
chronometer's  superiority  as  a  time-keeper.  But 
a  balance  and  escapement  of  themselves  will  not 
keep  time  at  all.     They  are  useless  without  a  main- 


EXAMPLES   OF  PRACTICAL  REASONING      211 
sprino:  and  a  train  of  intervenino:  wheel-work.     But     ^°°^  ^^^ 

^        o  _  o  Chapter  i 

if  any  one  were  explaining  the  causes  of  a  chronom- 
eter's exceptional  accuracy  he  would  never  think  of 
mentioning  these  last  at  all.  He  would  not  dwell 
on  the  properties  of  the  coil  of  elastic  steel,  or  on  the 
interaction  of  the  ordinary  toothed  wheels,  or  on  the 
steel  axes  which  make  their  interaction  possible. 
And  why  would  he  omit  these  causes .?  He  would 
omit  them  because  they  would  be  assumed,  because 
there  would  be  no  discussion  about  them,  and 
because  they  are  implied  in  the  existence  of  all 
watches  and  chronometers  equally.  If,  however, 
the  case  were  reversed  —  if  all  escapements  and  all 
balances  were  alike,  and  there  was  no  room  for 
superiority  except  in  the  main-spring  and  the 
wheel-work  —  the  latter  would  be  dwelt  on,  and 
the  former  would  be  passed  over,  in  any  discussion 
that  turned  on  the  causes  of  accurate  time- 
keeping. 

Let  us  take  one  case  more.     A  man  is  hanging  by  o^  the  causes 

,  ,     .     of  danger  to  a 

a  rope,  which  is  fastened  to  a  spike  of  rock,  and  is  man  who  is 
looking  for  samphire  or  birds'  eggs  on  the  face  of  a  a  ^pe.^ 
sheer  cliff.  It  is  suddenly  perceived  by  some  of  his 
friends  on  the  summit  that  the  rope  is  frayed  a 
yard  or  two  above  his  head.  They  are  anxious  for 
his  safety;  and  if  any  one  asked  them  why,  they 
would  answer,  Because  his  life  depends  on  the  rope 
not  breaking.  Let  us  suppose,  however,  that  the 
rope  is  perfectly  strong,  but  that  the  spike  of  rock 
it  is  attached  to  shows  signs  of  being  about  to 
fall.     The  man's  friends  in  that  case  will  explain 


212  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  III  their  anxiety  by  saying  that  his  life  depends  not 
on  the  rope  but  on  the  rock.  In  either  case  it 
would  literally  depend  on  both,  and  on  a  thousand 
other  things  besides ;  but  in  either  case  one  cause 
only  is  mentioned,  or  calls  for  mention,  and  that  is 
the  cause  whose  cessation  or  continuance  is  doubt- 
ful. For  similar  reasons,  and  in  a  similar  sense, 
great  men  are  said  to  be  the  causes  of  all  that  is 
done  or  produced  in  the  communities  to  which  they 
belong,  beyond  a  certain  minimum  which,  even 
when  not  insignificant,  is  stationary ;  for  though  the 
efforts  of  the  average  men  are  essential  to  the  pro- 
duction of  this  addition  to  the  minimum,  just  as 
they  are  to  the  production  of  the  minimum  itself, 
there  is  no  question  of  their  efforts  coming  to  an 
end  unless  the  men  come  to  an  end  also ;  whereas 
the  activities  of  the  great  men  require  special 
circumstances  for  their  development,  and  constitute 
the  only  productive  force  which  modern  democratic 
activity  practically  tends  to  paralyse,  or  at  all  events 
diminish  or  impede. 
But  there  is  But  thcrc  is  yct  auothcr  method,  still  more  neces- 

another  means  .  .  mii  i*i  ii  ^•  rr 

of  discriminat-  sary  to  bc  described,  by  which  we  are  able  to  dirfer- 
JJf  produces  of  ei^tiate  the  respective  products  of  these  two  classes 
exceptional      q£  j^gj^  —  3^  mcthod  which  will  assist  us  not  only  to 

men  and  -' 

ordinary  men.  assigu  to  cach  a  Certain  portion  of  one  joint  effect, 
but  also  to  particularise  many  of  the  elements  of 
which  each  portion  is  composed.  This  method  will 
be  explained  more  fully  in  the  following  chapter, 
but  it  will  be  well  to  give  a  general  and  preliminary 
explanation  of  it  here.     It  is  founded  on  the  two 


FACULTIES  AND  RESULTS  213 

following  propositions,  which,  when  once  they  have    ^°°^  ^" 
been   considered,  will    be   seen   to  be  self-evident. 
Whatever  the  many  contribute  to  the  social  con- This  is  by  an 

...  f  .  ...  -  f.  analysis  of  the 

ditions    of    a    community,    either    in    the   way   of  faculties 
industrial  production  or  of  the  formation  of  habits  producTIhe 
and  sentiments,  consists  of  effects  produced  by  those  p''°'^"'=*- 
traits    or   faculties  of   human    nature  in  which    all 
members  of  that  community  are  approximately  and 
practically  equal.     Thus  the  fact  that  all  men  are 
alike  obliged  to  eat,  and  that  all  parents  as  a  rule 
have  a  preference  for  their  own  offsprino^,  are  facts  Are  these 

1-11  •  1       •  1  T    .  r        ,1  faculties 

which  determine  much  in  the  conditions  of  all  possessed  by 
societies.  On  the  other  hand  the  social  effects  few  oniyV 
which  are  produced  exclusively  by  the  few  are 
effects  produced  by  certain  traits  and  faculties  which, 
though  possibly  possessed  in  a  rudimentary  state  by 
all  men,  are  appreciably  and  efficiently  developed 
in  the  persons  of  the  few  only.  The  dramas  of 
Shakespeare,  though  in  a  sense  they  are  eminently 
national,  could  never  have  been  produced  had 
Shakespeare  possessed  no  gifts  except  such  as  were 
possessed  at  the  time  by  the  English  nation  at 
large.  The  discoveries  of  Newton,  the  inventions 
of  Watt  and  Stephenson,  similarly  were  produced  by 
powers  that  were  indefinitely  above  the  average. 
It  is  needless  to  say  that  they  could  not  have  been 
produced  otherwise.  If  we  will  but  reflect  carefully 
on  obvious  truths  like  these,  we  shall  see  that 
civilisations  are  woven  out  of  two  kinds  of  materials, 
the  one  originating  in  traits  common  to  the  com- 
munity generally,  the  other  in  traits  confined  to  a 


214  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  III     more  or  less  numerous  minority;   and  even  when 

Chapter  i  •'  ' 

the  two  are  most  closely  woven  together  we  shall 
be  able  to  follow  out  and  identify  the  different 
threads,  which  never  can  lose  the  trace  of  their 
different  and  opposite  origins. 


CHAPTER   II 

THE  NATURE  AND  SCOPE  OF  PURELY  DEMOCRATIC 
ACTION,  OR  THE  ACTION  OF  AVERAGE  MEN  IN 
CO-OPERATION 

The  erreat-man  theory  as  held  by  the  conventional  cariyie  was 

•  1  ii/-<ii  11  •      wrong  in  his 

historian,  and  expressed  by  Carlyle  and  others  in  claims  for  the 
those    vehement    formulas    which    have    so    justly  becaure^he 
excited  the  ridicule  of  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer,  errs  [^.^tisVowL 
not  because  it  emphasises  the  fact  that  the  orreat  were  con- 

^  .  *^  ditioned  by  the 

man  is  the  sole  cause  of  progress  in  the  sense  that  capacities  of 
no  progress  could  have  taken  place  without  him,  meninfluenced 
but  because  it  ignores  the  fact  that  the  ordinary  ^^  *"™* 
men  of  his  time,  being  the   tools   with  which  he 
works,  or  the   instrument  on  which   he  plays,  the 
result  is  conditioned  not  only  by  his  capacities,  but 
by  theirs ;  just  as  the  kind  of  music   that  can  be 
produced  by  a  pianist  is  determined  not  only  by  his 
own  skill,  but  by  the  character  of  the  piano  also. 
Writers  like  Mr.  Spencer,  on  the  other  hand,  and  The  socialists 

r  '  ...  .  ^re  wrong 

with  him  the  whole  school  of  socialists,  impressed  because, seeing 
by  the  obvious  fact  that  the  many  do  something,  do^'something. 
never  pause  to  inquire  what  they  do,  or  how  much  iJey  do^evei^!* 
they  do,  or  how  little,  but  rush  to  the  conclusion  that  ^^'"g- 

215 


2i6  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  III     the  many  do  evervthinor.     This  conclusion  is  even 

Chapter  2  ^  jo 

more  meaningless    than   the  doctrine  which    it   is 
intended  to  contradict.     The  many  do  something, 
and  they  do  what  is  of  extreme  importance ;  but  its 
importance   is  strictly  limited,  and   is  indeed  only 
intelligible    through    its    limitations,    just    as    the 
character  of  a  profile  is  intelligible  only  through  its 
outlines.     The  object,  therefore,  of  the  sociological 
inquirer  must  be  to  discover  precisely  what  these 
What  the        limitations  are.      The   methods  by  which  the  dis- 
iTmited.^  We    covcry  is  to  be  made  have  been  already  indicated. 
Sy  wh^t'the  Let  us  now  go  on  to  apply  them.^    They  are  of  two 
limits  are.        kinds.     One  consists  of  an  examination  of  what,  in 
any  domain  of  activity,  the  many  would  produce,  if 
the  influence  of  the  few  were  absent.     The  other 
consists  in  an  examination  of  the  kind  of  faculties 
which  the  production  of  such  or  such  a  result  im- 
plies.    If  these  faculties  are  common  to  all,  we  say 
the  result  is  produced  by  the  many  ;  if  the  faculties 
are  rare,  we  say  it  is  produced  by  the  few. 
If  a  Russian         Xhc  practical    validity   of   both   these   kinds   of 
employs  a       rcasouing  is  shown  by  the  following  imaginary  but 
mTn[odig°'^ "  not  impossible  case.    A  hundred  Russian  workmen, 
u^a^ldrr*^'"'' ^^1  of   them  loyal   to  the   Czar,  are   employed   by 
a   citizen   of    Moscow   to   enlarge   a   subterranean 
cellar,  and  another  hundred  are  employed  to  fill  it 
with  heavy  wine-cases.     A  week  after  the  work  is 
completed  the  Czar  is  driving  outside,  and,  as  he 
passes  the  citizen's  house,  is  killed  by  an  explosion 
but  is  a  mine    f  rom  bclow.     The  so-callcd  cellar  was  a  mine,  the 
theCz^r"^"^  wiuc-cascs  wcrc  filled  with  dynamite.      Now  if  all 


DIFFERENT  ELEMENTS  IN  ONE  RESULT     217 
those  who  were  concerned  in  the  production  of  this     ^ook  iii 

*  Chapter  2 

catastrophe  were  tried  it  is  perfectly  evident  that 
the  part  played  by  the  workmen  would  be  sharply 
separated  from  that  played  by  the  man  employing 
them ;  and  that,  though  they  no  doubt  would  have 
contributed  something  to  the  result,  they  would  have 
contributed  nothing  to  its  essential  and  criminal 
elements.     It  is  equally  evident  that  if  the  designed  the  conspirator 

*■  ■^  ,      ,  *=*  contributes  the 

and   attained   result   had   been    not    criminal,    but  entire  criminal 
beneficent,  the  elements  in  it  that  made  it  glorious  the  enterprise, 
would  be  the  product  of  the  man  who  planned  and 
intended  it,  and  not  of  the  workmen  who  blindly 
obeyed  his  orders,  neither  knowing  nor  caring  what 
the  result  would  be.     Let  us  take  another  case  of  a 
somewhat  different  character.    When  a  spontaneous 
cheer  bursts  from  a  thousand  people,  the  volume  of 
sound  is  obviously  the  unadulterated  product  of  the 
many.     On  the  other  hand,  when  a  thousand  peo-  when  a  choir 
pie  with  ordinarily  good  voices  are  so  trained  and  mu!ic,  Handei 
organised  as   to   sing   a   chorus  out   of   Israel  ^^^  specific^chlr-^^ 
EzvPi,    the   peculiar   qualities    which    render    the  »«='«'"  ^^ '"^^ 

1  1  1      •  1       •         1      sounds  sung 

sounds  produced  by  them  valuable,  obviously  imply  by  them. 
the  existence  of  the  musical  genius  of  Handel,  or  in 
other  words  faculties  which  belong  to  hardly  one 
man  in  a  million,  and  are  thus  the  product  not  of 
the  many,  but  of  one. 

And  now  let  us  turn  to  the  actual  facts  of  life,  and  Let  us  turn  to 

.  the  facts  of 

the  kinds  of  activity  on  which  progress  and  civilisa- social  progress, 
tion  depend,  and  let  us  apply  our  two  analytical 
methods  to  these.     It   is  needless  to  repeat,  after 
what  has  been  said  in  a  previous  chapter,  that  it  is 


2i8  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  III     impossible,  in  a  case  like   this,  to  examine  social 

Chapters  \    ,  .    .        .        ^  .  ,  . 

activity  as  a  whole.  Such  activity  is  of  various  kinds, 
and  each  must  be  dealt  with  separately.  Let  us 
begin,  then,  with  two  —  the  activity  of  economic  pro- 
duction, and  the  activity  which  results  in  the  growth 
and  begin  with  of  spcculativc  knowledge.     The  first  affords  us  the 

economic  .  .  .   ,  .... 

progress  and  clcarcst  iliustration  of  how  to  discriminate  the  prod- 
knowTedge.  uct  of  the  many  by  considering  what  it  would 
shrink  to  were  the  influence  of  the  few  absent.  The 
second  affords  us  the  clearest  illustration  of  how  to 
discriminate  the  product  of  the  many  by  consider- 
ing the  nature  of  the  faculties  which  the  produc- 
tion of  the  result  implies. 
In  the  case  of       To  begin  with  production,  then,  let  us  take  the 

economic  r    i         tt     •         i  rr-  i  i  •  i  i 

progress  we  casc  01  the  U  nitcd  Kingdon,  and  consider  theamount 
method'o/  *  *  pei"  head  that  was  annually  produced  by  the  popula- 
is'^roXce'd'by  ^^^^  ^  huudrcd  ycars  ago.  This  amount  was  about 
labour  with      £iA.     At    the    present    time    it  is  something   like 

and  without  >.  ,       ,  ,         .  r  , 

the  assistance  ^35,  and  the  purchasing  power  of  money  has  so 
man.^^"^^^^  iucrcascd  with  the  cheapening  of  commodities,  that 
the  excess  of  the  latter  sum  over  the  former  is  far 
greater  than  it  seems.  Now,  if  we  attribute  the 
entire  production  of  this  country,  at  the  close  of  the 
last  century,  to  common  or  average  labour  (which  is 
plainly  an  absurd  concession),  \ve  shall  gain  some 
idea  of  what  the  utmost  limits  of  the  independent 
productivity  of  the  ordinary  man  are ;  for  the 
ordinary  man's  talents  as  a  producer,  when  directed 
by  nobody  but  himself,  have,  as  has  been  said 
already,  not  appreciably  increased  in  the  course  of 
two  thousand  years,  and  have  certainly  not  increased 


PROGRESS  IN  KNOWLEDGE  219 

within  the  past  three  generations.  The  only  thing  ^^ok  in 
that  has  increased  has  been  the  concentration  on  the 
ordinary  man's  productive  talents  of  the  productive 
talents  of  the  exceptional  man.  The  talents  of  the 
exceptional  man,  in  fact,  have  been  the  only  variant 
in  the  problem ;  and,  accordingly,  the  minimum  which 
these  talents  produce  is  the  total  difference  between 
£1^  and  ^35.  This  sum  is  no  mere  piece  of  fanci- 
ful ingenuity.  Parts  of  it  are  being  done  daily  before 
our  eyes,  and  its  practical  character  is  being  shown 
in  the  most  conclusive  manner,  when  the  profits  of 
a  business  decline  on  the  death  of  some  head  or 
partner,  or  when  some  declining  town  is  restored 
to  its  old  prosperity  by  some  man  of  industrial 
genius,  who  starts  in  it  some  new  manufacture. 

And  now  let  us  pass  from  industrial  activity  to  "^^  ^^^ 

•"■  ,  ''  question  of 

intellectual,  and  apply  to  this  our  second  method  progress  in 
of  analysis.     Of  purely  intellectual  results,  or,  as  Mill  nTusTa^ppiy '"^^ 
calls   them,    ''advances    in    speculative    knowledge',' ^^^^^^^^^[^ 
the   most   striking   examples   are   to   be  found   in  ^'="|*'"'^'^«. 

<^     ^  ^  involved  in  it. 

the  mathematical  sciences.     To  the  advances  made 
in  these  it  is  not  only  certain  but  obvious,  that  the 
many  have   contributed    nothing,  because  even   of 
that   section  of   mankind  which    has  some  mathe- 
matical  aptitude   the  majority  are  unable  even  to 
appreciate  them  completely  when  they  are  made; 
much  less  do  they  possess  the  powers  to  make  them. 
No  one  would  contend  that  the  books  of  Euclid  are  These  are 
the  result  of  the  faculties  possessed  by  every  average  entirely  con- 
school-boy,  or  of  the  kind  of  man  into  which  the  few. 
average  school-boy  grows.     We  may  indeed  dismiss 


220  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  III     purely  intellectual  progress  as  the  domain  in  which 

Chapter  u      ^  ^  r       q 

the  efficiency  of  the  many  stands  absolutely  at  zero. 

Let   us    pass   now   to   the    domain   of    political 

government,    and    consider    to    what    extent    the 

And  now  let     facultics  of   the   many,  as   distinct   from    those    of 

poihicai°        the   few,   are   capable   of    operating   there.      This 

government,     jj^q^jj-y   rcsolvcs    itsclf    mainly    into    the   question 

of   how   much   the    many    can    do   to    direct    the 

activity  of   the  few,  the  activity  of   the  few  being 

presupposed;    but  it  will  be  well  to  consider  first 

how  much,  if  anything,  the  many  can  accomplish,  or 

What  can  the   the  facultics  of  Ordinary  men  can  accomplish,  without 

faculties  of  .  •  i    r  i    •  i 

average  men    any  assistancc  from  exceptional  faculties  whatsoever, 
to^themseives?  In  the  domaiu  of  politics,  which  is  here  meant  to 
include  all  organised  action  of  a  public  and  political 
character,  as  well  as  the  making  and  the  administra- 
tion of  laws,  the  only  positive  functions  or  actions 
which  can  be  performed  by  the  co-operation  of  the 
average  faculties  of  men,  or  by  absolute  and  unadul- 
terated democracy,  are  very  simple  destructive  actions 
They  can        and  the  formulation  of  and  the  insistence  on,  very 
only  the  simplc  dcmauds.     Of  the  destructive  actions  referred 

aSnl*  to  we  shall  find  an  excellent  example  in  the  lynching 
of  a  negro  who  has  outraged  some  white  American 
girl,  or  in  such  an  act  as  the  burning  of  the  Tuileries 
by  the  communists.  In  each  of  these  actions  the 
feelings  of  those  who  take  part  in  it  are  as  nearly  as 
possible  identical.  In  the  first,  all  of  the  men  are 
equal  in  their  sense  of  righteous  indignation ;  in  the 
second,  they  are  all  equal  in  their  feeling  of  blind 
rebellion;   and   no   special   skill   is   in  either  case 


DEMOCRACY  AND  AVERAGE  FACULTIES     221 
required  by  any  one  of  them.     It  is  true  that  even     ^°°^  "' 

,  ,  Chapter  2 

in  such  cases  as  these  there  will  most  probably  be 
leaders,  of  some  sort,  but  they  will  be  leaders  by 
accident,  and  the  others  will  be  their  comrades 
rather  than  their  subordinates.  Of  the  simple 
demands  which  the  many  can  formulate  and  insist  ^"^^°"""'^*^ 

''  only  the 

upon  unaided  we  may  take  as  an  example  a  demand  simplest 
for  the  abolition  of  a  tax  which  distresses  in  an 
obvious  way  multitudes  of  men  equally;  or  a 
demand  for  the  continuance  of  a  war,  in  which  the 
issues  at  stake  are  sufficiently  apparent  to  anybody 
who  can  read  a  newspaper.  The  protest  against 
the  tax  by  the  multitudes  of  men  whom  it  harasses, 
and  the  national  demand,  when  it  arises,  for  the 
continuance  of  such  a  war,  are  phenomena  which 
are  absolutely  democratic.  They  are  each  the  sum 
of  a  number  of  spontaneous  feelings  and  reasonings. 
They  do  not  require  any  leader  to  stimulate  them ; 
and  all  who  contribute  to  their  force  do  so  in  an 
equal  degree. 

But  the  moment  we  come  to  cases  of  any  com-  The  moment 
plexity  the  situation  changes.     If  the  negro  s  guilt  become  at  aii 
could  be  established  only  by  inference,  the  lynchers  Acuities  of  the 
would  have  to  be  convinced  of  it  by  some  clever  exceptional 

-'  man  are 

advocate.  If  the  lynching  itself  were  a  matter  of  required. 
extreme  difficulty,  the  lynchers  would  require  to  be 
commanded  by  the  boldest  and  shrewdest  of  their 
number.  If  the  tax  protested  against  were  indirect, 
if  its  injurious  effects  were  hard  to  detect  and 
realise,  and  if  it  were  capable  of  being  represented 
as  less  injurious  than  any  other,  men  of  exceptional 


222 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  III 
Chapter  2 


Now  in  any 
civilised 
country  few 
governmental 
measures  are 
really  simple. 


Exceptional 
men  must 
simplify  them 
for  the  many. 


activity  and  exceptional  sharpness  would  be  required 
to  rouse  the  sufferers  to  a  perception  of  what  caused 
their  suffering.  In  other  words,  democracy,  the 
many,  or  the  faculties  possessed  by  the  many,  are 
incapable  of  initiation  in  any  complex  matter,  or  of 
carrying  out  any  course  of  complex  action  when 
initiated ;  and  we  may  sum  up  the  case  by  saying 
that  all  corporate  action  in  politics  is  less  and  less 
purely  democratic  in  proportion  as  the  questions 
dealt  with  are  less  and  less  simple. 

Now,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  in  any  civilised  country 
the  majority  of  the  measures  which  the  Government 
has  to  devise  and  carry  out,  however  simple  in 
appearance,  are  very  far  from  simple  in  reality. 
Even  when  their  details  are  few,  the  good  or  the 
bad  effects  of  them  are  certain  to  depend  on  a  great 
variety  of  circumstances,  with  regard  to  which 
ordinary  faculties  can  form  no  independent  judg- 
ment; and  if  ordinary  men  are  to  express  any  judg- 
ment on  such  measures  at  all  which  is  not  put  into 
their  mouths  by  others  and  then  uttered  by  rote, 
these  measures  must  be  placed  before  them  by 
talented  interpreters  and  advocates,  who  will  reduce 
the  details  to  a  real  or  apparent  simplicity  and 
invest  their  alleged  results  with  charm  and  an  air  of 
certainty.^      Accordingly,   when   we   approach    the 

1  This  truth  is  strikingly  illustrated  by  the  history  of  the  Home 
Rule  agitation  in  Ireland.  Whether  Home  Rule  would  be  advan- 
tageous for  the  British  Empire  or  for  Ireland  is  a  very  complicated 
question,  and  the  demand  for  it  consequently  never  became  genu- 
inely popular  until  it  was  identified  with  the  simplest  of  all  aspira- 
tions —  the  non-payment  of  rent. 


ORIGIN  OF  DEMOCRATIC   OPINION        223 

question  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  many,  we  do  ^"^^^  ^^^ 
nothing  but  arrive  at  the  same  conclusion  to  which  ^ 
we  were  brought  when  we  approached  it  from  the 
point  of  view  of  the  few.  We  arrive,  that  is  to  say, 
at  the  conclusion  that,  if  we  mean  by  government 
the  devising,  the  passing,  and  the  administration 
of  this  and  of  that  measure,  the  genuine  power  of 
the  many,  even  under  the  most  popular  constitution, 
becomes  less  and  less  in  proportion  as  the  greatness  '^'^"^  the  voice 

.  .  ,  *-*  of  the  many, 

and  the  civilisation  of  the  country  increases.     The  in  aii  complex 
voice  of  the  many  is  heard  as  loudly  as  ever ;  but  tTrvoice  of" 
what  guides  the  voice  is  not  the  personality  that  '^'^  ^^*' 
seems  to  utter  it.     What  guides  it  is  a  handful  of 
men,  exceptionally  active,  though  not  always  excep- 
tionally  wise.     The   voice   is   the  voice  of   Jacob, 
but  the  hands  are  the  hands  of  Esau. 

And  here  before  pursuing  the  subject  farther  let 
us  look  back  for  a  moment,  and  consider  the  point 
in  our  argument  at  which  we  have  now  arrived. 
We  have  seen,  then,  that  in  the  domain  of  modern 
industrial  activity  the  many,  if  we  estimate  the  total 
produced  in  terms  of  value,  produce  only  an  insig- . 
nificant  portion  of  the  total.  We  have  seen  that  in 
the  domain  of  intellectual  and  speculative  progress 
the  many  literally  produce  or  achieve  nothing.  We 
have  seen  that  in  the  devising  and  administration 
of  governmental  measures  the  many  are  powerful  in 
proportion  as  the  issues  are  exceptionally  simple 
—  that  is  to  say,  in  proportion  as  they  are  few  and 
far  between. 

Now  the  reader  may  think  that  this  brings  us  to 


224  ARISTOCRACY  AND   EVOLUTION 

Book  III     the  ej^(j  Qf  QUI-  inquiry ;  but  it  only  brings  us  to  the 

beginning  of  what  is  really  the  important  part  of  it. 

This,  however,  For  though  these  conclusions,  so  far  as  they  go,  are 

is  not  the  end        ii-i  11  ^^  r       ^ 

of  the  matter,  absolutely  truc,  they  by  no  means  dispose  of  the 
whole  question  which  is  before  us,  nor  do  they 
really  reduce  the  social  power  of  the  many  to  such 
small  dimensions  as  they  at  first  sight  seem  to  do. 
Thus  speculative  knowledge,  though  the  many  con- 
tribute nothing  to  its  progress,  itself  contributes 
nothing  to  progress  until  the  many  are  affected  by 
it,  and  respond  somehow  to  its  stimulus ;  economic 
production,  when  regarded  merely  as  an  affair  of 
quantity  or  as  an  accumulation  of  values  —  a  process 
in  which  the  part  played  by  the  many  is  humble  — 

for  the  details   docs  not  represent  that  process   in  its  true  social 

of  govern-  ,  ...  ^^    . 

mental  entirety;  nor  is  civil  government  wholly  an  affair 


measures  are 


iiiccuiui c:>  ixic  f  1*1  1*11*  1  11 

not  the  whole  01  mcasurcs  which  are  devised,  discussed,  amended, 
of  government,  (jgniandcd,  opposcd,  carHcd,  or  rejected  from  year 
to  year.  We  shall  find,  accordingly,  that,  in  spite  of 
what  has  just  been  said,  there  is  room  in  social  life 
for  the  operation  of  the  genuine  will  of  the  many  — 
of  pure,  spontaneous,  and  unadulterated  democracy. 
We  shall  find  that  the  power  of  this  will,  though  it 
is  in  certain  directions  incalculably  less  than  it  is 
at  present  generally  believed  to  be,  is  paramount  in 
domains  where  its  action  is  not  generally  recognised 
The  true         at  all;  and  the  nature  of  its  action  here  will  throw 

power  of  , 

democracy  is    3.  remarkable  light  on  the  nature  of  all  action  which 
reiiglonand"in  is  in  a  truc  scusc  dcmocratic.     Of  the  domains  of 
family  hfe.       activity  hcrc   referred   to,  the   most  important   are 
those  of  religion  and  family  life. 


RELIGION  AND   THE  AVERAGE  MAN      225 

Every  religion,  regarded  as  a  body  of  doctrines     ^°°^  "^ 
and  observances,  with  the   special  habits  of  mind 
and  dispositions  of  the  heart  which  are  appropriate  -^A^g^^Jof 
to  them,  which  has  ever  influenced  great  masses  of  '''^  g'^^at  man 

.,  .  .in  religion  is 

mankind,  is  mainly  a  result  of  pure  democratic  action,  enormous, 
It  is  true  that  in  the  establishment  of  the  great 
religions  of  the  world  another  agency  has  played  a 
great  part  also.  In  no  other  sphere  has  the  influence 
of  great  individuals  been  so  vast  and  so  far-reaching 
as  in  this.  The  mere  mention  of  such  personages 
as  Christ,  Buddha,  and  Mahomet  will  make  us  realise 
that  such  is  the  case ;  and  to  these  we  may  add  the 
missionaries,  saints,  and  theologians  who  have  spread  y^t  religions 

'-'  ^  have  only 

and  explained  the  respective  gospels  entrusted  to  grown  and 
them,  and  given  by  their  saintly  lives  examples  of  cL^JIhey 
the  value  of  their  teaching.     But  whilst  nowhere  is  S7hVave?ag? 
the   power   of   the  few  —  of   the  very  few  —  more '"^"• 
conspicuous  than  in  the  domain  of  religion,  nowhere 
is  the  power  of   the  many  more  conspicuous  also. 
No  religion  has  ever  grown,  become  established,  and 
influenced  the  lives  of  men  unless  its  doctrines  and 
its  spirit  have  appealed  to  those  wants  of  the  heart 
and   soul    which    have    been    shared,   to    a   degree 
approximately  equal,  by  all  members  of  the  commu- 
nities, nations,  or  races  amongst  whom  the  religion 
in  question  has  become  established. 

The  truth  of  this  statement  is  not  in  the  least  Christianity 

exemphnes 

invalidated  if  we  apply  it  to  a  religion  which  we  as- this  fact; 
sume  to  have  been  supernaturally  revealed.     Indeed, 
the  clearest  example  of  its  truth  may  be  found  in  the 
phenomenon  of  Christianity.     Whether  we  attrib- 
»5 


226  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  III     ute  the  doctrines  of  Christianity  to  a  natural  or  a 

Chapter  2  ...  ,,,... 

supernatural  source,  it  will  be  equally  plain  in  either 
case  that  they  have  found  acceptance  amongst  men 
because  there  was  something  inherent  in  the  nature 
of  each  individual  Christian  which  naturally  responded 
to  them.  Even  the  staunchest  Protestant  who  takes 
his  stand  most  exclusively  on  the  Bible  will  be  unable 
to  deny  that  Protestant  Christianity,  as  it  exists, 
represents  not  merely  an  assent  to  a  number  of  bare 
propositions  uttered  by  Christ,  or  made  with  regard 
to  Him  by  His  disciples,  but  also  the  subjective  inter- 
pretation given  to  these  by  each  believer  as  he  as- 
sents to  them.  Thus  the  doctrine  of  the  Atonement 
would  never  have  been  accepted  by  men,  it  would 
never  even  have  conveyed  any  meaning  to  them,  if 
there  had  not  been  something  in  their  nature  corre- 
sponding to  a  sense  of  sin ;  and  the  universal  effect 
which,  for  a  time  at  least,  this  doctrine  had  on  all 
the  Western  nations  and  on  all  classes  alike,  showed 
that  this  something  which  corresponded  with  the 
sense  of  sin  was  one  of  those  characteristics  in  which 
all  men  were  approximately  equal,  and  that  the 
acceptance  of  the  doctrine  was  therefore  a  true  act 
of  democracy, 
and  especially       gut   the   clcarcst   illustration   of   the   truth  thus 

Catholicism.      ... 

insisted  on  is  to  be  found,  not  amongst  the  vary- 
ing and  conflicting  doctrines  of  Protestantism,  which 
represent  theoretically  the  direct  result  of  the  re- 
vealed truths  of  the  Bible  on  each  believer  individu- 
ally, but  in  Christianity  as  represented  by  the  Church 
of  Rome.    According  to  ordinary  Protestant  opinion, 


AVERAGE  BELIEVER  AND    CATHOLICISM      227 
the  doctrines  of  the  Church  of  Rome  represent  a     5°°''  "^ 

.  Chapter  2 

structure   built  up   by  the  misguided  ingenuity  of 

priests,  and  imposed  by  them  on  a  credulous  and  ^^yiaS'bv 

passive   laity ;    but   so   far,    at   all    events,    as    the  the  aristocracy 

■••  •'  of  Popes  and 


ncils 


more  important  doctrines  are  concerned,  the  very  counc 
reverse  is  the  case  really.  It  has  been  the  world  amongsMhe 
of  ordinary  believers  that  has  imposed  its  beliefs  JJJo" believer's. 
on  the  priests;  not  the  priests  that  have  imposed 
them  on  the  world  of  ordinary  believers.  Let 
us  take,  for  instance,  the  Catholic  doctrine  of  the 
Eucharist,  or  the  beliefs  implied  in  the  ctiltus  of  the 
Virgin  Mary.  That  the  sacramental  elements  were 
actually  the  body  and  blood  of  Christ,  that  the 
Redeemer  who  died  on  the  cross  for  each  individual 
sinner  entered  under  the  form  of  these  elements 
into  each  sinner's  body  —  entered  bearing  the  stripes 
on  it  by  which  the  sinner  was  healed,  and  mixing 
with  the  sinner's  blood  the  divine  blood  that  had 
been  shed  for  him  —  this  was  the  belief  of  the  com- 
mon unlettered  communicant  long  before  priests 
and  theologians  had,  by  the  aid  of  Aristotle, 
explained  the  assumed  miracle  as  a  process  of 
transubstantiation ;  and  longer  still  before  their 
philosophic  explanation  was,  by  the  ratification  of 
any  general  Council,  given  its  place  amongst  the 
definite  teachings  of  the  Church.  Similarly,  the 
devotion  to  the  Virgin  Mary  first  sprang  up  amongst 
the  mass  of  believers  naturally,  because  the  idea  of 
God's  mother,  with  all  her  motherly  love,  with  all  her 
virgin  purity,  and  with  all  her  human  sorrows  allied 
so  closely  to  omnipotence,  touched  countless  hearts 


2  28  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  III     in  a  way  which  was  in  all  cases  practically  similar ; 

Chapter  2  '  . 

just  as  the  offer  of  a  helping  hand  would  make  a 

similar  appeal  to  each  one  of  a  multitude  of  men 

drowning.     The  official  teaching  of  the  Church  with 

Theologians     regard  to  the  Virgin's  sinlessness,  and  the  degree  of 

and  Councils  »  ,   .    -      .  °-  ,  ,  ,  ,  °, 

merely  worship  which  IS  her  due,  has  been  the  work,  no 

thrmateria"s    doubt,  of  the  few,  uot  of  the  many  —  of  priests,  of 

them^^*'^       theologians,  of  Councils,  of  the  spiritual  aristocracy ; 

but  the  doctrines  which  they  have  thus  defined  have 

been  no  more   fabricated   by  themselves  than  the 

wines,  good  or  bad,  which  a  peasantry  have  made 

for  centuries,  are  made  by  the  chemist  of  to-day, 

who  at  last  undertakes  to  analyse  them. 

Catholicism  It  has  been  said  that  the  part  which  democracy 

shows  the  great  -iii  r        ^'     '  •        ^  1 

part  played  by  plays  m  the  dcvelopmcut  01  religion  is  shown  us  by 
d^ariy  becTuse  the  Church  of  Romc  with  greater  distinctness  than 
Jj'^  P^'^j^P'^y^'^  it  is  by  any  other  great  communion  of  believers ; 
defined  by  it  and  the  rcason  is  that  no  other  great  communion  of 
believers  shows  us  with  so  much  precision  the  part 
played  by  an  aristocracy,  and  thus  leaves  the  part 
played  by  democracy  with  so  sharply  defined  a 
frontier.  The  Roman  Church  alone  is  in  possession 
of  a  complete  machinery  by  which  all  the  pious 
opinions  of  the  whole  body  of  its  members  —  the 
opinions  which  have  spontaneously  shaped  them- 
selves in  the  minds  of  innumerable  Christians  as  the 
result  of  a  multitude  of  independent  spiritual  experi- 
ences, and  which,  when  sufficiently  manifested,  have 
been  studied  by  various  theologians,  and  reduced 
by  them  to  logical  and  coherent  forms  —  shall 
be   finally  submitted   to  one   great   representative 


RELIGIOUS  DEMOCRACY  A   TYPE  229 

Council.     This  Council  considers  how  far  they  are     ^°°^  "^ 

.  Chapter  2 

consistent  with  doctrines  already  defined,  and  with 
one  another,  and  how  far,  explicitly  or  implicitly, 
there  is  any  warrant  for  them  in  the  Scriptures.  It 
ends  with  rejecting  some,  whilst  others  are  reconciled 
and  affirmed  by  it ;  and  then  these  last  are  added 
to  the  authoritative  teachings  of  the  Church.  But 
the  Council,  with  the  Pope  included  in  it,  is  nothing 
more  than  a  lens  by  which  the  rays  originating  in 
the  democracy  of  the  faithful  are  focalised  and  made 
to  transmit  a  clear  and  coherent  picture ;  and  the 
Roman  Catholic  religion,  regarded  as  a  body  of 
doctrines  which  have  actually  influenced  the  spiritual 
lives  of  men,  is  a  magnified  picture,  projected,  as 
it  were,  upon  the  sky,  of  those  secret  but  common 
elements  of  the  human  mind  and  heart,  in  virtue  of 
which  all  men  are  supposed  to  be  equal  before  God, 
and  which  unite  the  faithful  into  one  class,  instead 
of  graduating  them  into  many. 

This  analysis  of  what  may  be  called  the  natural  ca'^oiic'sm. 

-'  -'  however,  is 

history  of   Catholicism  may  be  thought,  perhaps,  only  aiiuded  to 

,,.,  '11  •  '11  here  because  it 

to   have   little   appreciable   connection  with   those  illustrates  the 

•    1  'I'l  11  I'll.  L.  essential  nature 

social  or  sociological  problems  which  at  present  of,ruiy  demo- 
agitate  the  world,  and  give  to  the  theory  of  de-  *="*'^  ^'=^'°"- 
mocracy  its  main  practical  interest.  But  neither 
Catholicism  nor  religion  at  large  has  been  referred 
to  here  for  its  own  sake.  They  have  been  referred 
to  because  the  case  of  religion  affords  a  singularly 
clear  illustration  of  the  essential  nature  of  democratic 
action  generally,  because  it  helps  us  to  understand 
that    action    in    the    affairs    of    ordinary   life,    and 


230  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  III     because  it  shows  us  very  vividly  how  democracy, 
as  a  political  power,  operates  outside  the  domain  to 
which  it  is  popularly  supposed  to  be  confined.^ 
Thus  en-  And  now  let  us  turn  again  to  a  nation's  family 

lightened  by  it  ,.  ,         ^•     ^  I'li  e 

let  us  turn  lifc,  aud  cousidcr  it  m  the  light  which  the  case  oi 
back  to  family  (^^^i^QiJcism  throws  ou  the  question  of  what, 
essentially,  democratic  action  is.  The  religious 
life  of  a  Catholic  is  meritorious  only  when  the 
beliefs  and  dispositions  of  heart  which  his  religion 
requires  of  him  are  spontaneous.  No  doubt  they 
may  have  been  developed  in  him  by  some  stimulus 
from  without,  but  it  is  essential  that,  when  once 
present  in  him,  they  should  draw  their  life  from 
himself.  A  saint  may  rouse  a  sinner  to  repent- 
ance, but  the  repentance  in  its  minutest  details 
must  be  the  sinner's  own  work.  He  must  be  his 
own  overseer,  he  must  be  his  own  taskmaster.  In 
economic  production  this  is  not  so.  A  bricklayer 
may  contribute  to  the  building  of  some  exquisite 
cathedral  without  any  sympathy  with  the  architect's 
intentions,  and  indeed  without  any  knowledge  of 
them ;  but  a  man  cannot  be  a  true  Christian  unless 
Christ's  will  becomes  his,  and  unless  the  beliefs 
suggested  from  without  are  seized  on  by  his  own 
soul,  and  made  a  part  of  himself  by  his  soul's  spon- 

*  The  political  power  of  the  religious  beliefs  of  a  community  can 
be  seen  at  a  glance  when  we  consider  our  own  government  of  India. 
Our  government  there,  in  the  ordinary  sense  of  the  word,  is  a  govern- 
ment of  the  few,  not  a  government  of  the  many ;  and  yet  the  religion 
or  religions  of  the  many  impose  limitations  on  our  legislators  as  strin- 
gent as  any  that  could  be  imposed  on  them  by  any  number  of  formal 
mandates. 


DEMOCRACY  AND   THE  FAMILY  231 

taneous    workinsrs.       Thus    the   common    religious     ^°°^ '" 

•^  ,  *^  Chapter  2 

opinions  of  the  mass  of  devout  Catholics  are,  theo- 
retically at  all  events,  the  sum  of  a  number  of  inde- 
pendent opinions,  which  agree  because  they  result 
from  a  number  of  similar  but  independent  experi-  Catholicism 

^  .      shows  that 

ences.     Here  we  have  the  essence  of   democratic  democracy  is  a 

1  J  1  •        •  1  <■  1        natural  coinci- 

action  —  namely,  a  natural  coincidence  ot   conclu-  dence  of  con- 
sions,  which    happen  to  be  identical,  not   because  *=^"5'°"'- 
those  who  hold  them  have  allowed  their  thinking  to 
be  done  for  them  by  the  same  thinkers,  but  because 
with  regard  to  the  points  in  question  they  naturally 
themselves  think  and  feel  identically. 

Now  the  home  or  family  lives  of  the  citizens  of '^•^  ^o'"* ''^« 

-'  ^  _  of  a  race 

any  race  or  nation  owe  their  points  of  identity  to  depends  on 
essentially   the   same    causes.      They   result    from  incidence,  or 
propensities   in    a   vast    multitude    of   men  which,  ousiHimi'i^ 
although    they  are  similar,  are  independent.     The  propensities, 
structure  of   the   family  differs   amongst   different 
races.     Amongst   some  it  is  based  on  polygamy; 
amongst  others  on  monogamy ;  but  no  matter  what 
its    details    in    either    case    may   be,    the    govern- 
ment, however  autocratic,  accommodates    itself   to 
the  family  life  of  the  people,  not  the  family  life  of 
the    people  to  the  laws   and    the   dictation  of   the 
government.     It  will  be  enough  to  confine  ourselves 
to  the  Western  or  progressive  races,  amongst  whom 
family  life  has  its  basis  in  monogamy.     Advocates 
of  socialism  often  distinctly  say,  and  the  principles 
of    socialism    beyond    all    doubt    require,    that   the 
family,  as  now  existing,  shall  be  practically  broken 
up;    and  that  whilst   the    union  of    the  parents  is 


232  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  III     made   terminable   with   an   ease   unapproached   at 

Chapter  2  ...  . 

present,  the  multiplication  of  children  shall  be 
regulated  by  State  authority,  and  that  the  children 
themselves  shall  be  reared  by  the  State  rather  than 
by  the  parents.  For  both  these  arrangements  there 
are  many  obvious  arguments,  which  are  from  the 
point  of  view  of  the  socialist  quite  unanswerable. 
If  the  State  binds  itself  to  provide  for  all  the  children 
that  are  born,  it  is  bound  to  claim  some  control  over 
the  number  of  them  that  shall  be  thrown  on  its 
hands.  If  the  State  is  to  be  the  sole  employer  and 
sole  director  of  labour,  it  must  settle  the  number  of 
children  that  shall  be  educated  for  each  branch  of 
industry.  If  the  solidarity  of  feeling  requisite  to 
make  socialism  possible  is  ever  to  be  obtained,  it 
can  be  obtained  only  by  fusing  into  one  those 
family  groups  now  so  obstinately  separate.  But 
here  the  socialists  encounter  one  of  their  great 
stumbling-blocks.^  In  theory  the  advocates  of  the 
extremest  and  most  complete  democracy,  they  are 
baffled  by  the  habits  and  character  of  the  very  masses 
to  whom  they  address  themselves.  There  may  be 
unhappy  homes,  and  there  may  be  unnatural  parents, 
but  the  masses,  as  a  whole,  will  not  listen  to  any 
proposal  for  invading  the  privacy  of  the  home  or 
for  tampering  with  the  parental  tie.     Any  average 

^  The  Italian  socialist,  Giovanni  Rossi,  who  attempted  in  1890 
to  found  a  socialistic  colony  in  Brazil  (an  attempt  which  completely 
failed),  attributes  his  failure  largely  to  the  tenacity  with  which  his 
followers  clung  to  family  life.  "  If  I  had  the  power,"  he  writes,  "  to 
banish  the  greatest  afflictions  of  this  world,  plagues,  wars,  famines, 
etc.,  etc.,  I  would  renounce  it,  if  instead  I  could  suppress  the  family." 


DEMOCRACY  AND   THE  HOME  233 

mother  would,  when  it  came  to  the  point,  tear  out     b°o^  ^^^ 
the    eyes    of    any    socialist    legislator  who,  under 
pretext   of    increasing   her   weekly   wages,   should 
seriously  attempt  to  snatch  her  children  out  of  her 
arms.     Similar  resistance  would  be  offered  to  any 
attempt  to  modify,  beyond  certain  limits,  the  institu- 
tion of  marriage,  or  to  interfere  in  any  way  with  the 
habits  of  a  people's  home  life.     These  habits  give  This  truly 
rise   to  legislation   by   the  few,   but  they   do   not  coincidence 
originate  in  it.     The  legislation  of  the  few,  on  the  g°o'^ernments 
contrary,  has  so  to  shape  itself  as  to  protect  those  datTth^"*"" 
modes   of  life  and  institutions  which  these  habits  selves  to  it. 
naturally  produce  ;  and    the  laws  that  do  this,  no 
matter  who  devises  and  administers  them,  come  into 
being  under  genuinely  democratic  dictation.     It  is 
a  genuinely  democratic  power  which  maintains  them 
unaltered,  or  imposes  its  own  limits  on  any  modifica- 
tion of  them  which  may  be  made. 

The  effects,  however,  of  the  natural  similarities  The  same 
of  men's  family  lives  are  not  to  be  found  only  in  power  deter- 
the  domain  of  laws  and  government.     They  confront  ^ructure^ofour 
us  even  more  openly  in  the  material  surroundings  *»o"ses, 
of  our  existence,  especially  in  the  structure  of  the 
dwellings   of  all   classes   except   the   lowest.     The 
detached  cottage  as  well  as  the  large  mansion,  the 
row  of  cottages  each  with  its  separate  door,  and  the 
tenement  of  three  rooms,  are  in  one  respect  all  alike. 
They  are  constructed  and   arranged  in  accordance 
with  those  propensities  which  keep  the  members  of 
the  family  group  united,  and   each    family   group 
separate  from  all  others.     Nor  do  matters  end  here ; 


234  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  III     for  if  the  propensities  which  result    in   family  life 

Chapters  r       r  r      ^  ^        ^■^^ 

affect  the  structure  of  the  dwelling,  other  tastes  or 
propensities  equally  spontaneous  determine  what 
commodities  shall  be  put  in  it.  It  is  true  that  these 
tastes  are  different  in  different  social  classes;  it  is 
and  the  furni-  truc  also  that  thev  have  not,  so  far  as  their  details 

ture  and  other  ,  , 

commodities  are  conccmed,  as  deep  a  root  m  our  nature  as 
mthem;  ^^^  propensities  which  give  its  character  to  the 
family.  They  are  stimulated,  sustained,  and  modified 
by  constant  suggestions  from  without,  by  circum- 
stances, and  by  tastes  which,  within  limits,  vary 
greatly ;  but  they  are  all  alike  in  this,  that  when 
they  become  efficient,  or,  in  other  words,  take  defi- 
nite shape  as  a  want,  the  want  has  become  a  part 
of  the  man  who  feels  it,  and  is  for  the  time  as 
spontaneous  as  are  the  family  instincts  themselves, 
and  indeed  on       The  influence,    howcvcr,    of   men's    spontaneous 

all  economic  ,  ..  ..  ..  111 

products.  wants  IS  not  confined  to  the  house  and  household 
appliances,  but  extends  itself  over  the  whole  domain 
of  economic  products.  And  here  we  are  brought 
back  again  to  another  portion  of  the  ground  which 
we  have  already  traversed.  We  are  brought  back 
to  the  domain  of  economic  production,  but  brought 
back  with  eyes  opened  to  a  new  order  of  facts. 

Now  before  we  proceed  to  a  consideration  of 
these,  let  us  recapitulate  what  has  been  said  with 
regard  to  this  subject  already.  The  main  fact 
which  was  dwelt  upon  in  our  previous  examination 
of  it  was  the  fact  that  in  wealth-production  all 
but  the  earlier  advances  are  due,  both  in  their 
achievement   and   their   maintenance,   to   the   few, 


SUPPLY  DEPENDENT  ON  THE  FEW        235 
and  to  the  few  alone.     The  practical  validity  of  this     ^°°^  '^^ 

.  .        •'  Chapter  s 

reasoning  has  been  shown  in  the  preceding  chapter, 
and  defended  against  the  common  objections  sure  to 
be  brought  against  it;  and  just  now  it  was  reinforced 
incidentally  when  we  were  considering  the  influence 
of  the  many  on  the  doctrines  of  the  Church  of  Rome ; 
for  whilst  the  essentially  democratic  origin  of  these 
doctrines  was  insisted  on,  it  was  shown  that  the 
religion  of  the  Catholic  democracy  could  have  no 
organic  growth,  no  definition  nor  cohesion,  without 
the  aristocracy  of  theologians  and  the  machinery  of 
popes    and   councils.     It  was  further   pointed    out  ^°'^*^°"shin 

^      ••■       ^  ^  -^      ^     _  the  process  of 

that  if   even    in  the   development   of   religion    the  production 

,  .  ,  .  ,  .  the  many  are 

many  are  dependent  on  the  exceptional  powers  of  dependent  on 
the  few,  in  the  process  of  economic  production  *^^^^^ 
they  are  incalculably  more  dependent.  For  whilst 
Catholicism  represents  the  ideas  of  the  multitude, 
analysed,  perfected,  and  carried  out  by  the  few, 
advanced  economic  production,  such  as  the  produc- 
tion of  a  beautiful  cathedral,  represents  the  ideas  of 
the  few  carried  out  in  partial  or  complete  ignorance 
by  the  multitude. 

Attention  must  now  be  called  to  certain  further 
facts  which  constitute  the  final  evidence  of  the  truth 
of  the  same  conclusions. 

The   facts    now   referred    to   are   those    of    con-  (^  ^^^^  ^'"'^'^ 

the  powers  of 

temporary  trade  unionism.     These  are  supposed  by  trade  unionism 
many  of  the  trade  unionists  and  their  sympathisers  mo^ 
to   show  the  growth  of   democratic  power  in   the  ^pp^'^^'^')- 
domain  of  production  generally.     What  they  do  in 
reality  is  to  exhibit  its  essential  limitations.     They 


236  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  III     show  this  in  a  way  which  is  hidden  from  the  careless 

Chapter  a        ,  .    ,         ,  .  ,      .  i        •   1        t 

thinker  by  a  curiously  inaccurate  and  misleading  use 
of  language.  Trade  unionism  is  constantly  described 
as  the  organisation  of  Labour.  In  reality  it  is  nothing 
of  the  kind.  It  is  an  organisation  of  labourers ;  and 
that,  as  we  shall  see,  is  a  totally  different  thing ;  for 
where  labourers  are  spoken  of  under  the  collective 
name  of  Labour,  they  are  so  spoken  of  with  special 
and  exclusive  reference  to  the  phenomena  which 
they  manifest  when  actually  exerting  themselves  in 
production.  Were  the  same  men  organised  for  some 
ethical  or  religious  purpose,  they  would  be  spoken 
of  not  as  Labour,  but  as  the  National  or  Popular 
Conscience.  The  organisation  of  Labour  is  the  set- 
ting men  to  perform  a  large  variety  of  correlated 
productive  tasks,  and  prescribing  to  each  man  what 
his  own  task  shall  be.  But  the  organisation  of 
labourers  that  has  been  brought  about  by  trade 
unionism  is  of  a  precisely  opposite  kind,  and  has 
a  precisely  opposite  end.  Its  end  is  not  production, 
but  the  cessation  of  production ;  not  the  prescribing, 
the  devising,  and  the  allotting  of  tasks,  but  the  taking 
men  away  from  them.  In  a  word,  it  is  the  organisation 
not  of  production,  but  of  obstruction  ;  nor  does  the  fact 
that  the  trade  unions  have  succeeded  in  organising 
the  latter  give  so  much  as  a  hint  that  they  would 
be  able  to  organise  the  former.  Even  if  they  could 
do  so,  it  would  be  the  leaders,  not  the  men,  that 
performed  the  feat  —  a  new  race  of  employers 
separating  themselves  from  the  body  of  the  em- 
ployed ;  and  this  fact  is  oddly  enough  acknowledged 


DEMAND  DEPENDENT  ON  THE  MANY     237 

by  the  very  men  who  are  apparently  most  blind  to 
it.  For  one  of  the  arguments  most  frequently  used 
to  show  the  practicability  of  industrial  democracy  is 
based  on  the  unusual  ability  manifested  by  the 
officials  of  the  trade  unions  in  managing  strikes  and 
great  demonstrations  of  strikers.  Must  not  these 
men,  it  is  asked,  have  very  exceptional  capacities 
who  can  gather  together  their  thousands  at  the 
shortest  possible  notice,  and  march  them  into 
Hyde  Park  through  the  crowded  thoroughfares  of 
London  ?  And  it  is  perfectly  true  that  many  of  the 
trade  union  leaders  are,  in  their  own  way,  men 
with  remarkable  and  exceptional  characteristics. 
But,  in  the  first  place,  the  more  that  their  admirers 
magnify  them,  the  more  do  they  detract  from  the 
democratic  character  of  trade  unionism ;  and  in  the 
second  place,  if  a  man  is  necessarily  exceptional 
because  he  can  so  far  organise  some  thousands  of 
men  as  to  march  them  occasionally  into  an  enclosure 
where  they  walk  about  sucking  oranges,  how  much 
more  exceptional  must  be  the  abilities  that  can 
organise  similar  men,  day  after  day,  for  the  per- 
formance of  the  most  intricately  adjusted  tasks,  in 
such  a  way  that  their  efforts  shall  result  in  an 
Atlantic  liner !  Trade  unionism,  then,  whatever  the 
ability  of  its  leaders,  does  not  represent  democratic 
action  in  the  actual  process  of  economic  production 
at  all ;  and  instead  of  pointing  to  any  development  of 
such  action  in  the  future,  merely  helps  to  show  us 
that  no  such  development  is  to  be  looked  for. 

Such   being  the   case,  then,  the  facts  that  now 


Book  in 
Chapter  2 


238 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  III 
Chapter  2 


yet  it  is  the 
wants  and 
tastes  of  the 
many  which 
determine 
what  shall  be 
produced ; 


claim  our  attention  will,  when  they  are  first  stated, 
wear  an  appearance  of  paradox;  for  though  the 
power  of  democracy,  in  the  advanced  processes  of 
production,  is  smaller  than  it  is  in  any  other  kind 
of  social  activity,  abstract  thought  and  discovery 
alone  excepted,  yet  it  exercises  an  influence  on 
production  none  the  less,  which  is  as  purely 
democratic  in  character  and  as  far-reaching  in  its 
consequences  as  that  which  it  has  ever  exercised 
over  the  doctrines  of  any  religion. 

For  what  is  the  object  of  production  ?  It  is  the 
satisfaction  of  human  wants,  which  begin  as  needs, 
and  gradually  develop  into  tastes.  The  multiplica- 
tion of  these  needs,  together  with  the  satisfaction 
of  them,  is  what  civilisation  means ;  and  though 
material  wealth  may  increase,  as  it  does  in  many 
new  countries,  without  any  concurrent  development 
of  civilisation  in  its  higher  forms,  civilisation  in  its 
higher  forms  cannot  increase,  and  certainly  cannot 
diffuse  itself  throughout  the  community  at  large, 
without  a  development  in  the  means  of  material 
production.  Books,  for  example,  though  they  are 
vehicles  of  mental  culture,  are  themselves  economic 
commodities,  and  depend  for  their  accessibility  to 
the  public  on  the  same  kind  of  industrial  agencies 
as  do  cotton,  sugar,  tobacco,  and  that  comforter  of  the 
nations — alcohol.  Refinement  of  taste  and  feeling, 
again,  is  largely  diffused  by  pictures  ;  but  the  ac- 
cessibility of  any  great  picture  to  the  vast  majority 
of  any  nation  depends  on  the  industrial  processes  by 
which  it  can  be  cheaply  and  faithfully  reproduced  — 


DEMAND  FOR   COMMODITIES  DEMOCRATIC    239 
processes   which   have   only  of   late  years   reached     ^°^^  ^" 

^  ...  ^  ^  Chapter  2 

any  sort  of  perfection. 

But  all  the  industrial  ingenuity  that  great  men  have 
ever  possessed  would  be  absolutely  futile  unless  the 
commodities  they  were  employed  in  producing,  or 
the  services  they  were  employed  in  rendering,  sat- and  though 

•    /-•■  1  ...  .  .  .  great  men 

istied  tastes  and  wants  existmg  m  various  sections  of  eiidt  these 
the  community.  The  eliciting  of  these  wants,  or  the  Zl^^x^mz^'' 
development  of  these  tastes,  depends  often  on  the  *^^'"' 
previous  supply  of  the  products  or  services  that 
minister  to  them.  Thus  the  introduction  of  rail- 
ways, of  the  electric  telegraph,  of  the  telephone,  of 
the  electric  light,  preceded  any  popular  demand  for 
them ;  and  many  a  great  writer,  according  to  the 
well-known  saying,  has  to  create  the  taste  by  which 
he  is  to  be  appreciated.  But  he  could  not  create 
the  taste,  or,  in  other  words,  make  it  actual,  unless 
it  existed  already  in  human  nature  as  a  potentiality, 
any  more  than  the  producers  of  electric  light  could 
make  the  general  public  anxious  to  have  it  in  their 
houses  if  mankind  at  large  entertained  no  wish 
whatever  to  do  anything  but  sleep  between  the 
hours  of  sunset  and  sunrise.  The  wants  and  tastes, 
then,   to  which   all  production    ministers,  whether  the  wants 

...  1  1       •  r  r         1  themselves 

common   to   all   men,  like   the  desire  tor  lood,  or  must  be  latent 


in  the  nature 


e  many. 


developed  by  influences  from  without,  like  the  desire  JJ  ,h' 
for  telegraphic  accommodation,  are,  when  once  they  ^ndwhen 

or  J   once  aroused 

are    in    existence,    essentially   democratic    in    their  are  essentially 

.  .  democratic 

nature.     They  are   not  like    the   movements  01   a  phenomena. 
mason,  who  constructs  under  an  architect's  order  a 
cathedral  with  the  design  of  which  he  has  nothing  at 


240  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  III  all  to  do.  They  represent  the  uncontrolled  prompt- 
ings of  the  individual's  own  nature,  and  they  affect 
production,  and  dictate  to  the  producers  what  they 
shall  produce,  because  they  represent  a  spontaneous 
similarity  of  taste  amongst  a  multitude  of  individuals 
living  under  similar  circumstances.  Here  we  have 
the  reconciliation  of  the  seemingly  contradictory 
facts,  that  the  power  of  the  many  over  production 
is  at  once  paramount  and  small. 
Thus,  though        Economic  demand,  thoutrh   it  owes  most  of  its 

economic  sup-  ...  i  •  i  i 

piyisaristo-  dcvelopmcnt  to  the  few,  is  yet,  when  its  develop- 
no^rtlk  demand  ment  has  taken  place,  fundamentally  democratic 
dem^ocratic.  ^^  ^^^  naturc.  But,  on  the  other  hand,  economic 
supply,  which  not  only  ministers  to  existing  wants, 
but  elicits  new  ones,  tends  ever  more  and  more  as 
civilisation  advances  to  depend  on  the  action  of  the 
few.  For  as  wants  increase  there  is  required,  in 
order  to  satisfy  them,  a  growing  elaboration  in  the 
methods  and  organisation  of  supply;  and  in  pro- 
portion as  supply  becomes  more  and  more  elabo- 
rately organised,  it  becomes,  from  the  necessities  of 
the  case,  less  and  less  democratic.  In  the  Middle 
Ages,  for  instance,  the  only  rich  supplying  class 
consisted  of  merchants,  because  the  exchange  of 
commodities,  and  the  bringing  them  in  the  required 
quantities  to  the  proper  markets,  was  a  process 
more  complicated  than  the  original  processes  of 
producing  them.  Production  has  now  become  quite 
as  complicated  as  commerce ;  and  a  manufacturing 
aristocracy  has  developed  itself  equal  in  wealth  to 
rthe  .commercial. 


DEMAND  FOR   COMMODITIES  DEMOCRATIC     241 

But    thouorh   supply  thus  depends   on  the  domi-     ^o^^^  ^^^ 

r        1  r  1  •  1      r    11  •    ,         ,  Chapter  2 

nation    of    the   few,   and    rises   and   falls  with  the 
ability  with  which   that  domination    is    exercised,  '^^^  "1°^* 

,       ,      '^,  .  gifted  brewer 

it  is  itself  at  the  same  time  under  the  domina-  cannot  make 
tion  of  the  many.  Some  industrial  genius  may  drink  beer 
make  a  colossal  fortune  by  directing  the  labour  of  j|!2[^°"°* 
some  thousands  of  men  to  the  production  (let  us 
say)  of  a  new  species  of  beer;  but  his  enterprise 
will  succeed  only  because  millions  of  men  like  the 
beer,  and  demand  it  under  the  direction  of  their  own 
taste  alone.  The  tastes  of  the  many,  of  course, 
exhibit  many  varieties.  Where  a  million  men 
demand  beer,  another  million  will  demand  whiskey ; 
and  there  are  many  commodities,  such  as  guns,  golf 
balls,  and  cricket  bats,  the  demand  for  which  is 
confined  to  comparatively  small  classes.  But  the 
point  here  insisted  on  is,  not  that  every  member  of 
the  community  demands  the  same  commodities, 
but  that  whatever  commodities  are  demanded,  are 
demanded  in  each  case  in  accordance  with  the 
spontaneous  wishes  of  individuals,  and  that  the  total 
force  of  the  demand  is  the  cumulative  result  of  a 
number  of  actions  and  desires  which  happen  to  be 
spontaneously  similar.  The  commodities  supplied 
to  them  have,  in  other  words,  to  be  accommodated 
to  a  genuinely  democratic  order ;  and  if  the  consum- 
ing democracy  does  not  consider  them  suitable,  it 
virtually,  by  refusing  to  buy  them,  condemns  them 
to  be  destroyed.  Thus  if  we  direct  our  attention  to 
consumption,  the  few  —  the  directors  of  industry  — 
are  the  servants  of  the  many ;  though  if  we  direct 

i6 


242  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  III     our  attention,  as  we  did  previously,  to  production,  the 
many,  in  the  capacity  of  workers,  are  the  servants  or 
subjects  of  the  few. 
Nowin politics      ^^^  j^Q^  let  yg  i-uj-j^   ba^,]^  to   the   domain   of 

also  there  is  a 

similar  demand  poHtics.     Wc  shall  find  that  wc  do  SO  posscssed  of 

and  supply ;        ^  i  r       i 

a  new  clue  to  the  true  nature  and  extent  of  the 
powers  of  the  many  there.  For  we  shall  find  that 
in  civil  government,  just  as  in  economic  production, 
the  process  involved  is  a  process  of  supply  and 
demand ;  and  that  whilst  there  is  a  certain  kind  of 
political  demand  in  respect  of  which  the  many  are 
paramount,  and  act  as  a  true  democracy,  their 
power  in  the  business  of  supply  is  never  more  than 
partial,  and  is  in  most  cases  illusory, 
but  the  truly  The  first  poiut  of  which  we  must  here  take 
demand  in      noticc  is  this  —  that   though  the  analogy  between 

politics  is  not  •  i       j.*  ^        •    •^  x.     • 

for  laws.  economic  production  and  civil  government  is  a 
genuine  one,  it  is  not  to  be  found  in  the  phenom- 
ena in  which  we  should  naturally  be  tempted  to 
look  for  it.  What  we  should  naturally  be  inclined 
to  do  would  be  to  take  the  demand  for  laws  and 
policies  as  the  counterpart  to  the  demand  for 
commodities,  and  the  framing  of  such  laws  and 
the  carrying  out  of  policies  as  the  counterpart  to 
economic  supply;  the  first  of  these,  like  the  demand 
for  commodities,  being  simple  and  spontaneous ;  the 
second  difficult,  like  the  manufacture  of  them.  But 
in  arguing  thus  we  should  be  wrong. 

The  demand  for  laws  and  policies  is,  as  we 
have  seen  already,  by  no  means  a  simple  thing, 
like  the  demand,  let  us  say,  for  a  particular  kind 


DEMAND  FOR  RESULTS  AND  FOR  MEANS     243 

of  beer ;  nor  is  it  the  true  counterpart  to  such  a     "Book  ni 

demand;  for   the    beer   is   demanded   for   its  own 

sake,    but   laws   and   policies    are    not.     They   are  "^"^^  ^^'"a"'' 

,  1      1    f  If  •  .    ,  for  laws  is  not 

demanded  for  the  sake  of  certam  results  on  social  the  counter- 
life  which,  by  various  processes  of  reasoning,  those  demrncTfor 
who  demand  them  have  been  led   to  believe  that  ^°'""'od'<'". 

for  commodi- 

they  will  produce ;  and  it  is  the  results  of  laws  and  ^'^^  ^""^  '^^■ 

,..  ,,  ....  ,  ,.         manded  for 

policies,  not  the  laws  and  policies  themselves,  which  their  own 
are  in  the  political  sphere  what  commodities  are  in  the  sawf"'^ 
the  economic,  and  for  which  alone  the  demand  is '^^"' '^""'^** 
purely  and  genuinely  democratic.    The  multitudes  of 
men  who  were  led  to  demand  the  abolition  of  the 
corn   laws    were   not   led   to   do   so    because    the 
actual  process  of   abolishing  them    was   profitable 
or  pleasurable  in  itself,  but  because  they  believed 
it  would   mean    a  larger   loaf   on    their   breakfast- 
tables.     It  was  in  the  demand  for  the  loaf  that  the 
many  were  spontaneously  unanimous,  and  expressed 
their  own  views,  not  those  of  anybody  else.     Their 
unanimity  in  demanding  the  measure  was  produced 
by  the  arguments  of  an  intellectual  oligarchy,  and 
could   not    have     been    produced    without    them. 
Thus   whilst  the  demand  for  the  larger  loaf  was  The  demand 
equivalent   to  a  demand  for  a   particular   kind    of  a  demand  that 
beer,  the  demand  for  the  law  was  equivalent  to  a  sh^uki^be"^^ 
demand  that  the  brewer  should  employ  some  novel  ^^^^  I^^^T! 

A       •'_  ^         special  kmd  of 

appliances  for  brewing,  with  the   merits  of   which  machinery, 
they  were  acquainted  only  through  the  puffs  and 
explanations  of  the  patentee. 

There    is    therefore    a   great  difference   between 
political  demand  and  economic.     Economic  demand 


244  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  III     is  single  ;  political  demand  is  double :  and   whilst 

Chapter  2  ^  .    . 

one  part  of  political  demand  —  namely,  the  demand 
No  one  makes  for  social  results  —  corrcsponds  with  economic  de- 

this  latter  '■ 

demand.  mand,  or  the  demand  of  the  consumer  for  com- 
mandTiingle;  modities,  the  other  part  of  political  demand  — 
demand  is  namely,  the  demand  for  particular  measures  —  does 
double.  jjq|-   correspond  with  economic  demand  at  all,  but 

is,  on  the  contrary,  in  contrast  to  it.  For  when 
workmen's  wives  buy  some  particular  make  of 
calico  for  their  husband's  shirts,  or  when  cyclists 
buy  some  particular  kind  of  tyre  for  their  bicy- 
cles they  do  so  because  they  approve  of  the  quali- 
ties which  those  goods  manifest  when  in  use, 
not  because  they  approve  of  the  machinery  by 
Political  de-     which    the  goods    were    made.      But    in    politics, 

mocracy is  vul-  ^  •       i-i  •  i  ^     r  ^•   •       ^ 

gariy  identified  although   thcrc  IS  likcwisc  a  demand  tor  political 

with  the  de-  -,  t  r  .    i  • .  i 

mand,  not  for  goods,  as  such,  —  for  social  sccurity,  personal  pros- 
buTfor^°°'^^*  psi"ity,  and  so  forth,  —  of  which  each  man  is  natu- 
machinery.  rally  his  own  judgc,  just  as  those  who  use  them  are 
of  the  tyres  or  calico,  and  although  statesmen  and 
governments  are  frequently  supported  by  the  nation, 
not  because  they  have  carried  this  measure  or  that, 
but  because  the  political  goods  supplied  by  them  are 
on  the  whole  satisfactory,  yet  the  political  demand 
which  is  supposed  to  be  the  special  characteristic  of 
democracies  is  not  a  demand  for  the  completed 
goods,  but  a  demand  that  this  or  that  patent  shall 
be  used  in  the  hope  of  producing  them. 

Now  political  patents  are  most  of  them  highly 
complicated  devices ;  the  action  of  all  of  them  is  de- 
pendent on  a  complication  of  circumstances ;  and  they 


DEMOCRACY  AS  A  DEMAND  FOR  MEANS     245 
are  always  the  work  of  a  special  class  of  inventors.     ^^°^  "^ 

T"!  1         •      M        •  1  Chapter  2 

rhey  never  represent  the  spontaneously  similar  ideas 
of  the  mass  of   ordinary  men,  any  more  than  the  ^"' '"  ^^  ^'^'' 

1     •  1  ^^  democracy 

machinery  used  in  a  great  brewery  represents  the  is  a  demand 
spontaneously  similar  ideas  of  the  happy  and  united  butfor^°°  ^ 
customers    whom    a    spontaneously    similar    taste  ™no^t'pureiy' 
leads  to  the  same  tied  house.     All  that  the  many  democratic. 
can  do   with    regard   to    these    political  patents  is 
to  listen   to    the    accounts    of   them  given   by  the 
patentees,  their  agents,  and  their  travellers,  and  to 
make  the  best  choice  they  can  between  a  number  of 
different  contrivances  which  they  have  had  no  share 
in  devising,  and  which    they  only  partially  under- 
stand.     They    are,     indeed,   in    much    the    same 
position  in  which  that  portion  of  the  public  would 
be  placed  which  travels  habitually  between  London 
and    Glasgow,   if   it   were    asked   to  decide   by  its 
votes  which  of  five  kinds  of  reversing  gear  should 
be  made  use  of  on  the  London  and  North  Western 
engines.     If  this  question  had  really  to  be  decided 
by  vote,  the  public  might  so  far  instruct  itself  by 
lectures  from  the  competing  inventors  as  to  give  The  demands 
votes  for  this  contrivance  or  for  that ;  but  the  very  are  manipu- 
grounds  on  which  its  choice  was  formed  would  be  J^J^^^  ^^  '^^ 
obviously  supplied  to  it  by  others ;  its  choice  would 
be  limited  by  the  number  of  the  contrivances  before 
it,  and  the  part  spontaneously  played  by  it  in  the 
whole  transaction  would  be  small.     And  yet,  as  has 
just  been  said,  it  is  the  making  of  a  choice  of  this 
kind  that  is  regarded  as  being,  in   the  domain  of 
politics,  typically,  if  not  exclusively,  the  exercise  of 


246  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  III  ti^e  power  of  the  many.  The  result  is  that,  whilst 
the  many  do  in  reality  exert,  through  their  spon- 
taneously similar  demand  for  certain  social  results, 
an  influence  on  legislation  which  in  certain  respects 
is  paramount,  the  political  theorist,  neglecting  this 
fact  altogether,  confines  himself  to  asserting  their 
Why.  then,      powcr  in  the  demand  for  political  means  —  the  kind 

is  democracy     '■  ,  ■*•  . 

specially  asso-  of   demand   in    respect    of    which   they   are   most 

ciated  with  the    •     r\  11  i  1 

demand  in      miluenced  by  others. 

powtli? least?  ^^^  what,  let  US  ask,  is  the  explanation  of  this 
fact-f*  How  does  it  come  that  in  government  a 
power  is  attributed  to  the  many  which  is,  even  by 
recent  socialists,  not  attributed  to  them  in  economic 
production  ?  The  reason  is  that  over  the  processes 
of  economic  production  the  many  can  exercise  no 
control  at  all,  but  that  over  the  devising  of  govern- 
mental measures  they  can  exercise  some,  which, 
though  absolutely  small,  is  yet,  by  comparison, 
large. 

Because  it  is         Thus,    for   instancc,    thous:h    the    structure   and 

the  only  sphere  _      _    "-^  , 

of  activity  in    manufacture  of  watches  is  in  one  sense  determmed 
many  can        by  the   many,  because   the  manufacture   of   those 
th'e^mldillll^  watches  only  can  be  continued  permanently  which 
of  supply  at     satisfy  the  many,  and  which  the  many  will  consent 
to  buy,  it  would  be  impossible  for  any  watchmaker 
to   produce   good   watches   at  all    if   his  workmen 
were  constantly  required  to  be  altering  or  readjust- 
ing the   escapements   in    order  to    introduce  some 
"  dodge  "  devised  by  any  man  in  the  street.     But  in 
politics  this  is  not  the  case.     The  influence  of  the 
men  in  the  street,  though  it  can  exert  itself  through 


DEMAND  FOR  MEANS  IN  POLITICS         247 

exceptional    men    only,    and    is    consequently    not     ^°°*'  ^'^ 

wholly  their  own,  does  continually  make  itself  felt 

in  law-making  as   it  does   not  make   itself  felt  in 

watchmaking ;  and  yet  the  conduct  of  government 

is  not  rendered  impossible,  whereas  the  making  of 

the  watches  would  be.     Indeed,  in  very  many  cases 

is  not  even  rendered  unsatisfactory. 

For  this  peculiarity  in  politics  there  are  three  ^nd  they  can 

interfere  with 

reasons.     One  is  that  the  connection  between  meas- it  here  because 
ures  and  the  general  welfare  of  the  community  is  polificar^  ° 
by  no  means  so  close  or  immediate  as  the  con- ^r^"''?^"' °° 

•'       _  life  are  less 

nection  between  a  watchmaker's  tool  and  the  wheel  ^lose  and  less 

.     •  1*11  1  •  •  o       •    1        rr  important  than 

or  pmion  to  which  he  applies  it.     Social  eiiects  the  effects  of 
follow  on  measures  slowly,  and  the  tendencies  of  bad  m"anaglment 
measures   are   neutralised   by   other   causes,     fhe  on  business; 
second    reason  is  that,  as  Mr.  Spencer  rightly  in- 
sists—  agreeing  in  this  judgment  with  the  wisdom 
of  Dr.  Johnson  —  the  social  ills  which  governments 
"  can  cause  or  cure "  are  far  less   numerous   than 
many  thinkers  imagine ;    and    the    third    reason  is 
one  with  which  we  are   already  familiar,  that   the 
power  of  the  many  in  determining  what  measures 
shall  be  adopted  is,  although   not  an  illusion,  less 
considerable  than  it  appears  to  be.     But  whatever 
their   power   in    this    respect,    the    great    point   to  and  in  any 

«••«  ca-  ,       C3S6  tne  &p* 

remember   is   that   it  cannot   exert   itself  or  exist  parent  power 
for  any  practical   purpose    unless    the  few  provide  even  h^elfon- 
it  with  the   means  of  doing  so,  any  more   than  aj^^"^^^^^^* 
rudder   has   power   to   guide    a   ship    unless   some 
other   power   shall    have    set    the    ship    in   motion. 
The  popular  demand  for  measures,  or  the  popular 


248  ARISTOCRACY  AND   EVOLUTION 

Book  III     choice  between  them,  alike  presupposes  the  few  who 

Chapter  2  .  ..... 

will  make  the  supply  a  possibility. 
The  power  of       And  if  the  power  of   the  many  over  supply  is 

the  many  is  a  ^,  .•'  ... 

power  to         thus  limited  even  in  the  domain  of  politics,  in  the 

determine  the      ,  .,  .  ■,        ,-  •,     •  I'-.i 

quality  of  domain  of  economic  production  it  is  more  limited 
progrestnoT'^  Still,  and  in  the  domain  of  intellectual  progress  it  is 
to  produce  absolutcly  non-existent.  Their  true  power  is  in 
their  demand  for  completed  results  —  for  knowledge 
which  they  can  assimilate,  for  dogmas  logically 
stated,  which  reveal  to  them  clearly  what  they 
already  believe  dimly,  for  food  they  can  enjoy,  for 
clothes  that  please  their  eyes,  for  commodities  and 
appliances  that  minister  to  their  comfort  and  con- 
venience, for  social  security,  for  freedom,  and  for 
personal  and  national  prosperity.  In  other  words 
the  truth,  when  properly  understood,  is  a  truism. 
The  many  are  all  powerful  in  determining  the  quality 
of  progress  and  civilisation  because  it  is  their  own 
tastes  and  wants  to  which  civilisation  must  minister, 
and  their  own  qualities  which  civilisation  must  draw 
out ;  but  of  initiating  civilisation,  of  advancing  it,  or 
even  maintaining  it,  the  many  are  absolutely  in- 
capable unless  they  have  the  few  to  guide  them. 
They  contain  within  themselves  the  things  that 
have  to  be  developed,  but  they  cannot  themselves 
provide  themselves  with  the  conditions  of  their  own 
development.  Without  the  few  to  assist  them  they 
could  no  more  progress  than  a  train  of  railway 
carriages  could  progress  in  the  absence  of  the 
locomotive. 

It  is  impossible,  however,  to  state  these  conclu- 


THE  MANY  DEPENDENT  ON  THE  FEW     249 
sions  plainly  without  realising:  that  in  some  quarters     ^ook  in 

.    1  ,  .         .  .„    1  1  ,  .       .         Chapter  2 

Violent  objections  will  be  taken  to  them ;  nor  is  it 
difficult  to  see  on  what  grounds  the  objections  will 
rest.  These  shall  accordingly  be  discussed  in  the 
next  chapter;  and  it  shall  be  shown  that  the  con- 
clusions to  which  our  inquiry  has  brought  us  thus 
far  really  contain  in  them  nothing  inconsistent  with 
the  sentiments,  or  incompatible  with  the  objects,  of 
even,  those  extreme  reformers  who  will  certainly  feel 
impelled  to  attack  them. 


It  will  be  ob- 
jected that  the 


CHAPTER     III 

THE     QUALITIES    OF    THE     ORDINARY,    AS     OPPOSED    TO 
THE    GREAT,    MAN 

The  objections  which  will  be  taken  to  the   con- 
conciusions     clusion  arrived  at  in  the  preceding  chapter  resolve 

reached  in  the  .  r        i   •    i 

last  chapter     thcmselvcs  into  two  groups,  one  of  which  rests  on 

derogate  from  ,  ■,  ,  ^  •  j^    i  •  i 

the  dignity  of   gcncral  and   more   or   less   sentimental  considera- 

man^''^'^^*^     tions,  the  other  on  practical.     We  will  deal  with  the 

former  first. 

This  group  of  objections  will,  by  those  persons 

who   entertain   them,    be   probably  first   expressed 

in  an  outburst   of   fine  indignation  at  the  wrong 

which  the  conclusions   just  epitomised  do  to  the 

average  man ;   for  such  persons  will   at  once  take 

them   as    implying    that    the    average    man    is   a 

miserable  and  helpless  creature  with  only  enough 

intelligence  to  carry  out  blindly  the  orders  which 

his    betters    are    condescending    enough    to    give 

him;    and  this  implication  will  strike  them   as   a 

wanton  insult.     They  will  think  over  various  men 

in  private  and  humble  life  who  were  never  thought 

by  themselves  or  others  to  be   above  the  average 

level,  but  who  yet  were   gifted  with   intelligence, 

250 


MEANING    OF  TERM  ORDINARY  MAN       251 

taste,  and  skill  equal  to  any  possessed  by  the  men  ^^^^  ^" 
who  are  called  great.  They  will  reflect  that  these 
men  represent  not  the  few,  but  the  many ;  and  they 
will  angrily  reject  a  theory  which  frankly  denies  to 
the  many  any  of  those  forces  which  specifically 
make  for  progress. 

But  this  class  of  objections,  which  was   already  ^ut  they  do 

I'ni  1  1  '  ^      '  1       "°*  really  do 

briefly  glanced  at  when  we  were  considermg  the  so; 
precise  points  by  which  the  great  man  is  dis- 
tinguished from  the  average  man,  will  disappear 
altogether  when  we  take  the  matter  conversely  and 
consider  the  precise  points  in  which  the  average 
man  differs  from  the  great  man. 

In  any  discussion  that  aims  at  scientific  precision  for  since  the 

.     .  .  ....  ,        great  man,  as 

it  IS  necessary  to  give  to  the  principal  terms  used  a  here  techni- 
far  more   definite  meaning  than  is  given  to  them  JJ" mln^who '^ 
when  they  are  used  ordinarily ;  for  most  words  when  '"^"^"^^s 

•'  -'  '  others  so  as 

used  ordinarily  have  several  meanings,  but  when  used  to  promote 

1       •       11  1  1  1  A  progress, 

technically  they  must  have  only  one.  Any  term, 
then,  when  used  technically  will  of  necessity  specifi- 
cally exclude  a  number  of  ideas — and  it  may  be  very 
important  ones  —  which  are  frequently  attached  to  it 
when  it  is  used  in  conversation  or  general  literaturie. 
This  observation,  as  the  reader  will  readily  perceive, 
has  a  special  application  to  our  use  of  the  term^r^<a;/ 
man.  The  greatness  of  the  great  man,  regarded  as 
an  agent  of  progress,  is  a  quality,  as  has  been  said, 
which  is  to  be  measured  by  its  overt  results;  and 
its  overt  results  consist  of,  and  are  brought  about 
by,  not  what  he  does  in  his  own  person,  but  what 
he  makes  others  do.     It  is  needless  to  insist  upon 


25*  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  III     this  truth  again,  as  it  has  been  explained  at  great 

length  already,  and  it  is  impossible  that  any  reader 

can  misunderstand  it.     What  it  is  necessary  for  us 

here  to  explain  and  insist  upon  is  its  converse  — 

the  ordinary     namely,  that  if  the  essence  of  technical  greatness  is 

man,  as  '      r\  ^  '  iiri 

opposed  to      so  to  mfluence  the  actions  or  thoughts  of  other  men 

b^'tupid.  "°'  fhat  the  productivity  of  human  labour  is  increased 

or  the  scope  of  human  thought  enlarged,  no  man  is 

technically  great  who  is  not  in  this  way  influential. 

When  we  come  to  reflect  closely  on  this  definition, 

some  of   the   results  will   strike  us  as   not  a  little 

curious ;  for  if  we  exclude  from  the  class  of  great 

He  is  merely    mcn  and  rclcgatc  to  the  class  of  ordinary  men  all 

talents  do  not   thosc  whosc  grcatucss  bcgins  and  ends  with  them- 

effiSncy  of     sclvcs,  and  docs  not  tend  to  communicate  itself  to 

other  men.      ^^y  Qj^g    bcsidc   themsclvcs,  SO  as  to  make  others 

think  or  act  more  efficiently  than  they  would  unaided, 

ordinary  men,  or  the  many,  in  our  present  technical 

sense  of  the  words,  will  include  a  number  of  men  of 

the  most  brilliant  capacities  and  accomplishments. 

Poets,  in  this        Th^  ercatcst  Docts,  for  iustance,  will  in  this  way 

technical  sense,  '-'  '■   ^  _  ,  -' 

are  ordinary  bc  classcd  as  Ordinary  men,  whilst  the  inventor  of 
machinery  for  making  good  boots  cheaply  will  be 
classed  as  a  great  man.  And  the  reason  is  as 
follows.  A  great  inventor  is  great  as  an  agent  of 
progress  because  when  the  apparatus  invented  by 
him  is  in  process  of  being  manufactured,  and  a 
thousand  workmen  are  shaping  or  multiplying  its 
separate  parts,  or  again,  when  ten  thousand  other 
workmen  are  using  the  machines  when  completed, 
he  makes  each  workman  do  precisely  what  he  would 


SKILL  NOT  A  KIND   OF  GREATNESS       253 
do  himself  if  he  were  performino:  their  several  tasks     ^^^'^  ^" 

'■  '-'  Chapter  3 

actually  with  his  own  hands.  But  a  great  poet  — 
let  us  say  Shakespeare  —  could  not  in  a  similar  way 
so  influence  a  thousand  ordinary  writers  that  they 
should  all  of  them  be  producing  plays  like  Macbeth 
or  Hamlet.  Indeed,  the  greater  the  poet  is,  the 
more  absolutely  incommunicable  is  his  gift.  Shake- 
speare may  have  so  far  contributed  to  progress  as  to 
have  aided  in  the  development  of  literary  English 
generally,  but  he  has  not,  in  the  course  of  some  three 
hundred  years,  brought  into  existence  one  drama- 
tist comparable  to  himself.^  In  art,  in  fact,  after  a 
certain  point  has  been  passed,  it  can  hardly  be  said 
that  there  is  any  progress  at  all. 

It  is  still  more  important  to  observe  that  what  is  so  are  the  most 

.  *•  skilful  manual 

true  of  the  arts  is  also  true  of  the  crafts,  or,  in  other  workers, 
words,  those  kinds  of  manual  work  whose  special  char- 
acteristic is  rare  personal  skill.  Manual  skill,  though 
essential  to  material  progress  no  less  than  unskilled 
labour  is,  does  not,  except  during  the  earlier  stages 
of  civilisation,  itself  constitute  an  actively  progres- 
sive principle.  That  is  to  say,  at  a  very  early  stage 
in  the  development  of  productive  industry  manual 
skill  reaches  its  utmost  limits,  and  thenceforward  re- 
mains stationary,  whilst  industry  continues  to  pro- 
gress.    Thus  the  skill  which  is  evidenced  by  the 

^  Of  course  the  great  poet,  like  the  great  religious  teacher,  may 
have  an  effect  on  the  thoughts  and  imaginations  of  his  readers,  and 
he  may  be  a  great  man  or  an  agent  of  progress  in  this  way.  But  he 
is  not,  in  the  technical  sense  of  the  word,  a  great  man  in  reference  to 
his  own  art.     He  does  not  promote  progress  amongst  other  poets. 


254  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  III     orem-enscravino;  of  the  Greeks  and  Romans  has  rarely 

Chapters      °  °  ^     .  .    ,  , 

been  equalled  since,  and  has  certainly  never  been 
surpassed.  But  we  need  not  stop  short  at  the 
antiquity  of  the  Greeks  and  Romans.  Many  of  the 
implements  made  by  the  prehistoric  lake-dwellers 
could  not,  so  far  as  mere  manual  workmanship  is 
concerned,  be  better  made  by  any  workman  or 
mechanic  of  to-day.  Indeed,  so  far  is  the  progress 
of  material  civilisation  from  depending  on  or  coin- 
for  very  great    cidino:  with   auv  prosfrcss   in   manual  skill,  that  it 

manual  skill  ,,        ,  /  •  •  i        r      i 

does  not  pro-  actually  dcpcuds  on  a  getting  rid  of  the  necessity, 
^r°infCce"^  Hot  Certainly  of  all  skill,  but  of  skill  of  the  rarer 
others,  kinds.     If  any  machine,  for  example,  depended  for 

its  successful  operation  on  an  accurate  finish  in 
certain  essential  parts  which  only  one  workman  in 
half  a  million  could  give,  such  a  machine  would  be 
practically  almost  worthless.  A  productive  machine 
is  of  use  in  the  service  of  society  generally  in  pro- 
portion as  the  machines  or  processes  by  which  it  is 
itself  manufactured  obviate  the  necessity  for  any 
skill  in  manufacturing  it  beyond  such  as  can  be 
obtained  with  considerable  ease  and  constancy. 

Many  sentimentalists  —  and  it  is  difficult  not  to 
sympathise  with  them  —  regret  the  manner  in  which 
manufacture  is  thus  superseding  craftsmanship,  or 
that  kind  of  production  in  which  the  beauty  or 
excellence  of  the  product  is  the  direct  result  and 
expression  of  the  skill  of  one  producer.  But  this 
natural  regret,  though  most  frequently  expressed 
by  socialists,  is  defensible  only  on  grounds  of  the 
narrowest   social   exclusiveness.      That   the   artist- 


PROGRESS  AND    CRAFTSMANSHIP  255 

craftsman  who  gives  his  talents  directly  to  each  par-  ^oo'^  ^" 
ticular  commodity  in  the  production  of  which  he  is 
concerned  —  a  silver  cup,  or  a  lamp,  or  a  curiously- 
designed  carpet,  or  a  printed  volume  —  will  produce 
objects  having  a  charm  which  is  wanting  in  similar 
objects  produced  by  the  methods  of  the  manufacturer 
is,  no  doubt,  true.  But  great  artist-craftsmen  being 
few  in  number,  the  beautiful  objects  they  make  by 
the  craftsman's  methods  are  few  in  number  also,  and 
are  consequently  obtainable  by  a  few  persons  only ; 
whilst  the  objects  inferior,  but  approximately  similar 
to  them,  which  the  great  manufacturer  multiplies  in 
indefinite  quantities,  are  accessible  to  the  many, 
who,  under  any  social  system,  must  either  have 
these  or  have  nothing  of  the  kind  at  all.  An  artist- 
craftsman,  for  example,  such  as  the  late  Mr. 
William  Morris,  or  a  transcriber  and  illuminator  in 
a  mediaeval  monastery,  could  produce  a  volume 
indefinitely  more  beautiful  than  any  product  of  the 
steam  printing-press ;  but  a  book  which  the  methods 
of  the  manufacturer  would  admit  of  being  sold  for 
sixpence  might  cost,  if  produced  by  the  craftsman, 
twice  that  number  of  pounds  ;  and  it  is  easy  to  see 
that,  supposing  a  study  of  the  Bible  to  be  desirable, 
a  village  comprising  four  hundred  and  eighty  families 
would  be  benefited  more  by  each  family  having  a 
sixpenny  Bible  of  its  own  than  it  would  by  the  exist- 
ence of  one  sumptuous  copy  chained  to  a  desk  in  the 
village  church  or  reading-room. 

Rare   manual    skill,  in   short,  does    not   promote 
progress,  or   help    to   maintain   civilisation  at  any 


256  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  III     oriven   level,  unless   it  can   metamorphose   itself  — 

Chapters      »      .  '  .  ^ 

as  m   many  cases  it  can  do  by  means  of  patterns 
unless  it  can     or  otherwisc  —  into  a  series  of  orders  which  men 

be  metamor-  1         1  1  1   -ii 

phosedinto  who  havc  Icss  SKill  Can  execute,  and  thus  affects 
orders^gfvrn  to  commodltics  uot  directly,  but  indirectly.  So  long 
others.  ^g  jj.  j-esides  in  exertions  of  the  craftsman's  hand, 

applied  directly  to  each  commodity  produced,  it  has 
on  the  progress  of  the  arts  generally  no  effect  at  all. 
The  man  or  men  who  invented  the  slide  rest  com- 
municated a  new  power  to  every  one  of  the  in- 
numerable artisans  now  using  it ;  but  an  artisan 
who  should  produce  exceptionally  accurate  work, 
owing  to  the  exceptional  accuracy  and  steadiness  of 
his  own  hand,  could  no  more  add  anything  to  the 
faculties  of  even  one  of  his  fellows  than  a  beautiful 
woman  can,  by  means  of  her  own  beauty,  improve 
the  eyes,  nose,  or  hair  of  her  plainer  sisters. 
Material  progress,  then,  as  has  just  been  said,  is 
so  far  from  being  dependent  on  the  growth  of  rare 
manual  skill  that  it  takes  place  in  proportion  as  the 
necessity  for  such  skill  is  eliminated. 
Again,  brill-         And  now  let  US  tum  from  the  consideration  of 

iance  or  charm 

in  private  life  humau  capacitics,  as  applied  to  and  expressing 
m°oTe°progress.  thcmselvcs  in  the  production  of  particular  com- 
modities or  results,  and  consider  them  as  they 
reveal  themselves  in  ordinary  life  and  conversation. 
We  shall  find  ourselves  confronted  by  a  similar  set 
of  facts  here.  We  shall  see  that  many  of  the  talents 
and  qualities  which,  when  possessed  by  our  friends 
or  by  ourselves,  elicit  our  strongest  admiration,  and 
give  an  interest  to  human  nature,  do    nothing    to 


DIGNITY  OF  THE    ORDINARY  MAN         257 

advance  or  to  maintain  civilisation  at  all.  No  one,  ^^^'^  "^ 
for  example,  who  knows  anything  of  English  society 
will  deny  that  conversational  wit  is  one  of  the  rarest 
faculties  to  be  met  with  in  it,  and  earns  for  its 
possessor  the  reputation  of  an  exceptionally  brilliant 
man;  but  its  possession  by  one  man  does  not  cause 
its  existence  in  others.  The  wit  leaves  the  rest  of 
society  precisely  where  he  found  it.  The  same  is 
the  case  with  private  goodness  and  wisdom.  They 
may  indeed  affect  an  exceedingly  small  circle,  but 
there  is  in  their  influence  nothing  certain  or  lasting. 
The  most  highly  moral  parents  have  often  the  most 
dissipated  sons ;  it  requires  almost  as  much  wisdom 
to  take  sound  advice  as  to  give  it;  even  if  the 
sensible  and  the  excellent  exert  a  good  influence  on 
their  own  friends,  they  have  no  tendency  to  inaugu- 
rate any  general  moral  advance ;  and  a  man  whose 
life  is  rendered  interesting  by  an  exceptionally  ro- 
mantic passion  may  illustrate  the  capacities  of 
human  nature,  but  he  does  nothing  to  expand  them. 

It  will  thus  be  seen  that  when  we  describe  the  Therefore  the 

'.  e  1*1  1'  r  '  '   t    ordinary  men, 

majority  or  mankmd  as  bemg  so  far  passive  with  who  do  not 
regard  to  the  production   of  progress  that  unless  PJesTlre^not 
there  were  a  minority  of  men  with  faculties  which  fsserted  to  be 

...  ...  lacking  m  high 

the  majority  do  not  possess,  no  progress  or  civilisa-  qualities. 
tion  would  take  place  at  all,  we  are  not  declaring 
that  the  larger  part  of  mankind  are  stupid,  foolish, 
unskilful,  or  void  of  resource,  or  that  human  nature 
as  exemplified  in  the  normal  man  or  woman  is 
not  often  noble  and  beautiful,  and  is  not  always 
interesting.  On  the  contrary,  the  very  reverse  is  the 
17 


«S8  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  III     case.     What  is  really  interesting:  in  human  life  and 

Chapters       .  .       ,  .  i  i  •       i     i 

in  human  nature  is  the  universal  and  typical  elements 
in  it,  not  the  exceptional;  and  we  can  show  ourselves 
the  truth  of  this  in  a  very  convincing  way  by  looking 
into  the  mirror  that  is  held  up  to  nature  by  art. 
Indeed  what  is  Thc  most  famous  and  interesting  characters  to  be 

really  interest-  ,    .        -       .  •         i  i  i  11 

ing  in  human  fouud  in  hction  or  lu  the  drama,  though  they  may 
t"ypk;al  part^of  havc  bccn  iuvcstcd  by  their  creators  with  exceptional 
It,  not  the        circumstances  and  endowed  with  exceptional  gifts, 

exceptional,  ^  o         ' 

have  interested  and  appealed  both  to  the  world  and 
their  creators  through  the  qualities  and  experiences 
which  they  share  with  human  beings  generally,  not 
through  those  which  may  incidentally  make  them 
peculiar.  Very  few  men,  for  example,  are  as 
intellectual  as  Hamlet;  but  Hamlet  has  interested 
the  world  because,  as  has  been  well  said  of  him, 
he  is  not  "  a  man,"  but  "  man."  If  a  great  dramatist 
or  novelist  makes  his  heroes  exceptional,  he  does  so 
only  because  he  can,  by  this  device,  more  easily  give 
a  magnified  representation  of  what  is  universal ;  and 
as  we  may  see  the  uuivcrsal   clcmcnts  which  he  magnifies   excite 

by  referring  to  ...  ,  ,  1   m   •        1 

art  and  poetry,  uuivcrsal  intcrcst,  not  bccause  they  are  exhibited 
on  more  than  a  common  scale,  but  because  they  are 
thus  exhibited  with  a  more  than  common  clearness. 
What  are  the  most  beautiful  love-poems  that  have 
made  their  writers  immortal  but  an  expression  of 
what  is  felt  by  millions,  though  it  can  be  expressed 
only  by  a  few  ?  Why  is  there  life  still  in  the  two 
marriage  songs  of  Catullus,  if  it  were  not  for  the 
living  strings  in  the  normal  human  heart  which  the 
magic  of  his  hand  still  touches } 


ARISTOTLE    ON  THE  AVERAGE  MAN       259 
But  not  only  is  the  normal  man  the  type  of  what     b°°''  'i^ 

.       .  .  ,     .  .        ,  -'.,,.         Chapter  3 

IS  mterestmg  and  important  m  humanity.  He  is 
also  the  type  of  wise  conduct  in  life,  and  secures 
amongst  men  in  general  a  conformity  to  this  con- 
duct, not  by  means  of  advice  given  by  exceptionally 
excellent  individuals,  but  by  the  purely  democratic 
pressure  of  cumulative  class  opinion.  The  force 
which  this  opinion  exercises  is  commonly  called 
"  The  World."     The  details  of  its  injunctions  and  Average 

1   •!   'i'  yrr  ,      •  ^•  rr  1  1  opinion  also  on 

prohibitions  are  dirierent  in  diiierent  classes;  and  sodai matters 
when  it  is  called  "  The  World,"  reference  is  usually  daS^thTwise 
being   made   to   the    pressure   exercised    by   it   in°P™°"! 
the   highest  classes    only.     But   this   limitation   of 
meaning    is    altogether   arbitrary.      Every  class    is 
"  The    World,"    so   far   as    regards    itself.      It   has 
its   own  standards  of  manners,   honour,  prudence, 
dress,  and   also  of   moral  judgment  as   applied   to 
social  conduct;  and  it  is  in  respect  of  all  of  them 
incalculably  wiser  than  most  individuals  who  differ 
from  it.     In  social  life  even  the  greatest  genius  is 
ridiculous,  in  so  far  as  he  is  unusual  in  anything 
except  his  greatness. 

It  is,  moreover,  the   same   cumulative  common  and  the 
sense,  the  same  spontaneous  identity  of  perception  fiesTSred^"" 
on  the  part  of  ordinary  men,  that  forms,  as  Aristotle  oL^sense'the 
says,  the  fundamental   test  of  what  is   real.     The  ^"^  °^  ^''"'h. 
world  of  reality  is  distinguished  from  the  world  of 
dreams  because  the  former  is  the  same  for  all  men. 
It  is  6  Trao-t  Sofcet.     The  same  fact  is  the  foundation 
and  the  justification  of  trial  by  jury  —  an  institution 
in  which,  as  Sir   Henry   Maine  has  observed,  we 


26o 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  III 
Chapter  3 

Therefore  in 
denying  to 
average  men 
the  powers 
that  produce 
progress, 


we  are  not 
degrading  the 
average  man. 
We  are  merely 
asserting  that 
these  powers 
form  but  a 
small  part  of 
life. 


have  the  very  abstract  and  essence  of  all  practicable 
democratic  government. 

It  is  true  that  even  here  we  are  brought  sharply 
back  again  to  those  limitations  by  which  the  powers 
of  the  normal  man  are  surrounded.  The  jury,  who 
represent  the  normal  man's  intelligence,  require,  as 
Sir  Henry  Maine  points  out,  to  have  the  facts  on 
which  they  are  to  base  their  judgment,  in  exact  pro- 
portion as  these  are  obscure  or  complicated,  reduced 
to  order  for  them  by  advocates  whose  powers  are 
more  than  normal.  It  is  also  true  that,  though 
it  is  the  identity  of  ordinary  men's  perceptions 
which  shows  the  reality  and  the  qualities  of  ex- 
ternal objects,  ordinary  men's  perceptions  would 
never  have  sufhced  to  show  us  that  the  earth  was 
not  the  centre  of  the  universe,  and  that  the  sun 
did  not  move  round  it.  But  the  true  moral  of  all 
that  has  been  just  insisted  on  is,  that  in  denying  to 
the  masses  of  mankind  those  special  powers  which 
actively  initiate  and  actively  promote  progress,  and 
actively  sustain  the  fabric  of  advanced  civilisation, 
we  are  not  denying  to  the  masses  of  mankind  great 
moral  and  great  intellectual  qualities  generally. 
We  are  not  asserting  that  the  normal,  the  average, 
the  ordinary  man  is  incapable  of  being  developed 
into  a  creature  endowed  with  beliefs,  thoughts,  and 
feelings  which  are  not  only  noble  and  correct,  but 
which  expand  and  improve  as  civilisation  advances. 
We  are  merely  asserting  that  the  ordinary  man,  or 
the  masses  of  mankind,  which  are  simply  the  or- 
dinary man  multiplied,  cannot  provide  themselves 


PROGRESS  NOT  THE    WHOLE    OF  LIFE     261 
with  the  conditions  of  their  own  progressive  develop-     ^°°^  ^" 

,  .        ^     .,,  ^        Chapters 

ment ;  or,  to  put  the  matter  in  a  still  more  compre- 
hensive way,  we  are  merely  asserting  that  that 
particular  form  of  greatness  which  improves  those 
conditions  or  sustains  them,  by  influencing,  or  com- 
pelling, or  enabling  masses  of  men  to  act  or  think 
as  they  would  not  act  or  think  otherwise,  consti- 
tutes a  very  small  portion  of  human  activity,  and  a 
still  smaller  portion  of  human  life. 

This  truth  has  been  lost  sight  of  because  modern 
social  philosophers,  led  astray  by  political  and  other 
passions,  have  confused  two  distinct  things — man 
as  a  moral  being,  moving  in  a  circle  of  prescribed 
duties,  and  man  as  a  being  capable  of  public  or  social 
initiative ;  and  the  more  we  study  the  ordinary 
man,  and  the  more  fully  we  appreciate  the  varied 
possibilities  of  his  nature,  the  more  clearly  shall 
we  see,  and  the  more  ungrudgingly  shall  we  rec- 
ognise, how  absolutely  he  is,  so  far  as  civilisation 
is  concerned,  dependent  on  the  exceptional  man 
for  even  those  very  powers  in  virtue  of  which 
the  action  of  the  exceptional  man  is  controlled  by 
him. 

The  general  or  the  sentimental  objections,  then, 
which  might  not  unnaturally  arise  in  the  minds  of 
many  when  the  claims  of  the  great  man  to  be  the 
sole  agent  of  progress  are  first  broadly  asserted,  are 
found  to  disappear  altogether  when  the  meaning  of 
these  claims  is  more  fully  considered.  But  senti- 
mental objections,  as  has  been  said  already,  are  by 
no  means  the  only  objections  which  these  claims  have 


262  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  III     to   encounter.     Objections  will   be   raised   agrainst 

Chapters  .  •  i  i  •  i 

them  which  are  economic  rather  than  sentimental, 
and  which,  moreover,  —  this  is  a  still  more  important 
fact,  —  rest   solely  upon  a  practical,  and   have  no 
theoretical,  basis. 
Socialists  can        Jq  order  to  scc  what  these  objections  are  it  will  be 

object  to  this  .  .  .     "' 

conclusion       wcU  to  cousidcr  them  in  their  extremest  and  most 

only  because  it  ..  f  ■,-,,■  ...  ...  .. 

establishes  the  uucompromisiug  lorm.  We  will  accordingly  consider 
doiTi  men 'r  them  as  put  forward  by  the  socialists.  That  the 
exceptional      objcctions  of  the  socialists  to  the  claims  made  for  the 

wealth.  ■' 

great  man  are  not  grounded  in  any  theory  that  con- 
sistently disallows  them,  is  sufficiently  shown  by 
the  fact  that  even  the  most  extreme  socialists, 
no  less  than  the  members  of  every  other  militant 
party,  are  always  extolling  the  exceptional  qualities 
of  their  own  leaders.  Agitators,  thinkers,  and  writers 
like  Karl  Marx,  Lassalle,  and  Engels  have  been 
extolled  by  their  followers  as  though  in  their  own 
way  equal  to  Caesar  and  Napoleon,  to  Aristotle, 
Galileo,  and  Bacon;  and  their  works  are  continually 
called  "  marvels  of  reasoning,"  and  described  as 
evincing  "  such  powers  of  thought  as  are  given  to 
only  a  few  men  in  the  course  of  five  hundred 
years."  The  arguments,  therefore,  which  are  em- 
ployed by  socialistic  thinkers  to  convince  them 
that  the  great  man  is  not  essential  to  social  progress, 
and  plays  no  real  part  in  it  —  those  arguments  to 
the  examination  of  which  the  first  chapters  of  this 
work  were  devoted,  do  not  really  convince  even  those 
who  lay  most  stress  on  them,  so  far  as  they  are 
applicable  to  social   progress   generally.     For   the 


SOCIALISTS  AND   THE  AVERAGE  MAN      263 
socialists  in  practice  are  forced  to  limit  the  applica-     ^ook  in 

,,  I'lr  -I  •  1  1       Chapter  3 

tion  01  them  to  two  kmds  01  social  action  only ;  and 
these  are  social  activity  in  the  domains  of  political 
government  and  of  wealth-production.  They  are, 
moreover,  applied  to  the  latter  of  these  with  so  much 
more  strictness  than  to  the  former,  that  the  objec- 
tions to  the  special  claims  of  the  great  man  as  a  They  cannot 
wealth-producer  are  the  only  ones  that  here  require  th^e'Jret'icai 
our  attention.  S^'STa,:"' 

Now  even  here  we  shall  find  that  the  objections  beginning  to 

■'  recognise  the 

in  question  are  originated  not  by  theoretical,  but  by  importance  of 

.  .       1  ...  .  f  .      .  the  exceptional 

practical  considerations  only ;  for  one  of  the  most  man  them- 
curious  features  in  the  history  of  socialistic  thought,  ^^^''"* 
from  the  time  when  socialists  claim  that  it  first 
began  to  be  scientific  till  to-day,  has  been  the  unwill- 
ing replacement,  in  their  theory  of  production  and 
progress,  of  that  factor  or  element  —  and  this  factor 
is  the  great  man — which  Karl  Marx,  with  his  doctrine 
of  labour  as  the  sole  creator  of  value,  had  eliminated. 
Under  one  disguise  or  another  the  great  or  excep- 
tional man,  as  distinct  from  the  average  labourer 
whose  productivity  is  measured  by  time,  has  been 
put  back  in  the  place  from  which  the  theory  of  Marx 
had  ousted  him;  and  the  inventors,  the  men  of  enter- 
prise, the  organisers  and  capitalists  of  to-day  —  or,  as 
Mr.  Sidney  Webb  calls  them,  "  the  monopolists  of 
business  ability''' — are  given  back  to  us  in  the  guise 
of  officials  of  the  bureaucratic  State,  armed  by  the 
State  with  the  industrial  powers  of  slave-owners.  It 
is  true  that  socialistic  theorists  still  do  their  utmost 
to  hide  from  themselves  and  their  followers  the  nature 


264 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  III 
Chapter  3 


and  only 
obscure  the 
fact  for  pur- 
poses of 
popular  agita- 
tion. 


So  far,  how- 
ever, as  the 
reasoning  of 
this  book  has 
gone  already, 
no  claim  has 


of  this  change,  by  means  of  those  curious  arguments 
which  find  their  chief  exponent  in  Mr.  Spencer,  and 
which  have  rendered  sociology  thus  far  so  useless 
as  a  practical  science.  But  the  change  is  but  partly 
hidden,  nevertheless,  even  from  themselves. 

Why,  then,  should  they  endeavour  to  hide  it  at 
all  ?  Why  should  they  shrink  from  a  perfectly  frank 
avowal  —  an  avowal  which  they  are  constantly  com- 
pelled to  make  by  implication  —  that  the  great 
man's  power  in  wealth-production  is  what  has  been 
described,  and  that  every  increase  in  the  wealth  of 
civilised  communities  is  due  to  him }  They  shrink 
from  making  this  avowal  for  one  reason  only.  This 
reason  is  that  their  main  practical  object  is  to  repre- 
sent the  possessions  of  the  great  man,  or  of  the  few, 
as  a  treasure  to  which  the  few  have  no  theoretical 
right,  and  which  can  be,  and  ought  to  be,  divided 
amongst  the  many.  They  are  therefore  compelled, 
by  the  necessities  of  popular  agitation,  to  obscure  the 
part  that  the  few  have  played  in  producing  it,  and 
to  pretend,  so  far  as  possible,  that  it  is  produced  by 
the  undifferentiated  many.  If  it  were  not  for  its 
promise  to  the  many  of  some  indefinite  pecuniary 
gain,  it  may  safely  be  said  that  socialism  would  have 
been  never  heard  of ;  and  if  this  pecuniary  promise 
were  made  good,  the  demands  of  the  socialists,  as  a 
practical  party,  would  be  satisfied. 

And  now  having  considered  this,  let  the  reader 
look  back  at  the  claims  that  have,  in  our  present 
argument,  been  advanced  for  the  great  man  thus  far. 
It  will  be  seen  that  not  a  single  claim  has  been 


SOCIALISM  AND  PRECEDING  ARGUMENTS     265 

advanced  on  his  behalf  to  which,  on  practical  grounds,     b^""^  '^i 
any  socialist  could  object.     We  have  not  assumed 
that  out  of  all  the  wealth  he  produces  he  shall  take  a  been  made  for 
larger,  or  even  so  large  a  share,  as  the  least  efBcient  to  which 
of  his  workmen.     On  the  contrary,  we  have  assumed  objectT  "^^^ 
that  his  contributions  to  the  national  wealth  find  their 
way  into  the  pockets  of  those  around  him,  and  that  for 
him  nothing  is  left  but  the  bare  means  of  subsistence. 
It  has  indeed  been  shown  that  he  must  necessarily 
have  the  control  of  capital,  and  be  free  to  use  it  in  the 
way  that  he  thinks  best ;  but  this  is  only  because  the 
control  of  capital  affords  the  sole  means  by  which, 
amongst  free  men,  industrial  discipline  can  be  en- 
forced  and  the  productive  genius   of   the   few  be 
communicated  to  the  muscles  of  the  many.     For  all 
that  has  been  said  thus  far  to  the  contrary,  the  great 
man  himself  may  derive  from  his  control  of  it  no 
advantage  whatsoever.     We  have  assumed  only  that  for  we  have 
by  his  use  of  it  he  shall  concentrate  his  exceptional  he  keeps  none 
faculties  on  the  practical  business  of  wealth-produc-  Sonaf weauh 
tion  with  as  much  intensity  and  devotion  as    he  J^^gjf^^'  ^°^ 
would  do  if  the  whole  of  what  he  produced  were  to 
go  into  his  own  coffers.     We  have,  in  fact,  been 
regarding  the  great  man  as  being  socially  the  servant 
of  the  ordinary  men,  though  in  technical  matters  he 
is  their  master. 

So  far,  then,  as  our  argument  has  up  to  this  point 
proceeded,  we  have  merely  in  our  theory  assigned 
to  the  great  man  functions  which  are  implicitly 
assigned  to  him  in  the  reasonings  of  the  more  recent 
socialists   themselves,  whilst   in  practice  we   have 


266 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  III 
Chapter  3 


but  that  he 
works  exactly 
on  the  terms 
the  socialists 
would  dictate 
to  him. 


It  now  remains 
to  consider 
whether  he 
would  really 
do  so. 


assumed  the  realisation  of  the  very  conditions  at 
which  socialism  aims.  For  let  us  consider  very 
briefly  what  these  conditions  are.  The  more  care- 
fully the  theoretical  admissions  and  the  practical 
promises  of  the  more  recent  socialists  are  examined, 
the  more  clear  does  it  become  that  the  sole  essential 
change  which  socialism  would  introduce  into  the 
existing  economic  regime  would  consist  not  in  getting 
rid  of  the  great  man,  but  in  securing  his  activity  on 
totally  new  terms.  The  socialists  aim,  in  fact,  at 
securing  the  best  industrial  masters  and  treating 
them  like  the  worst  servants.  This,  as  social 
reformers,  is  their  fundamental  peculiarity.  For 
whilst  they  propose  to  secure  an  equal  distribution 
of  products,  they  implicitly  admit  that  the  producers 
may  be  divided  into  three  classes  —  the  men  of  ex- 
ceptional ability  who  produce  an  exceptional  amount 
of  wealth ;  the  mass  of  average  men  who  produce 
a  normal  amount ;  and  the  idle,  the  refractory,  and 
the  worthless,  who  produce  less  than  the  normal 
amount ;  and  they  propose  accordingly  to  apportion 
the  products  as  follows.  To  the  average  man  they 
would  give  twice  as  much  as  he  produces;  to  the 
idle  and  the  worthless  man  they  would  give  a  hun- 
dred times  as  much  as  he  produces ;  and  to  the 
great  man,  on  whose  talents  the  fortunes  of  all  the 
others  depend,  they  would  give  from  a  hundredth 
to  a  thousandth  part  of  what  he  produces. 

Now,  whatever  the  reader  may  think  of  this 
economic  programme,  there  is  nothing  in  the  present 
work,  thus  far,  to  show  that  it  is  impossible ;  and  if 


THE    GREAT  MAN'S  REWARD  267 

the  object  of  socialists  is  to  level  social  conditions, 
to  abolish  all  differences  of  rank,  and  to  confiscate 
all  exceptional  incomes,  this  book  up  to  the  present 
point  might  be  accepted  as  a  handbook  of  sociahsm. 
For  the  reader  will  recollect  that  when  it  was  said 
that  the  great  man's  activity  involved  the  existence 
of  motives  which  would  lead  him  to  develop  his 
faculties,  and  that  without  such  motives  these  facul- 
ties would  be  practically  non-existent,  the  question 
of  what  these  motives  were  was  for  the  time  alto- 
gether waived,  and  we  assumed  the  development 
and  the  subsequent  exercise  of  his  abilities  as 
something  that  would  take  place  no  matter  under 
what  conditions.  The  question,  however,  which 
we  then  put  on  one  side  must  now  be  taken  up  and 
submitted  to  a  careful  examination.  It  being  granted 
that  the  activity  of  the  great  man  is  necessary,  on 
what  conditions  can  his  activity  be  secured  ?  Can  it 
be  secured  on  the  conditions  that  are  proposed  by 
socialism,  or  on  any  others  that  even  remotely 
resemble  them.? 


Book  III 
Chapter  3 


BOOK   IV 


CHAPTER   I 

THE  DEPENDENCE  OF  EXCEPTIONAL  ACTION  ON  THE 
ATTAINABILITY  OF  EXCEPTIONAL  REWARD,  OR 
THE  NECESSARY  CORRESPONDENCE  BETWEEN  THE 
MOTIVES   TO   ACTION   AND    ITS    RESULTS 

In  enterino:  on  the  inquiry  which  now  lies  before  Great  men 

.      .  °  n  1  ...       differ  from 

US  it  IS  necessary  to  recall  to  the  reader,  and  to  insist  ordinary  men 
with  renewed  emphasis,  on  a  fact  which  has  been  ex-  ITot  i^kind !*  ^' 
plained  with  the  utmost  fulness  already.  This  is  the 
fact  that  those  exceptional  efficiencies  of  the  few  on 
which  the  initiation,  the  progress,  and  the  mainten- 
ance of  civilisation  depend,  and  which  in  a  technical 
sense  we  have  here  described  2iS  greatness,  do  not  con- 
sist of  qualities  which  are  unique  in  kind,  or  which  are 
not  possessed  in  some  measure  by  the  masses  of  or- 
dinary men ;  but  that  they  are  made  up  of  ordinary 
faculties  magnified  or  mixed  together  in  unusual  pro- 
portions. For  although,  as  George  Eliot  observes  in 
a  striking  passage,  the  faculties  of  all  men  are  the 
same  in  kind,  they  manifest  themselves  in  different 
men  in  such  very  different  degrees  that  a  faculty  or 
feeling  which  in  one  man  has  the  power  and  dimen- 
sions of  a  tiger,  may  never  in  another  man  outgrow 

271 


272 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  IV 
Chapter  i 


and  the  use  of 
exceptional 
powers  is  con- 
ditioned like 
the  use  of 
ordinary 
powers. 


Now  let  us 
take  the  most 
universal 
powers 
possessed  by 
man,  viz. 
those  used  in 
acquiring  the 
simplest  food. 


Man's  powers 
in  agriculture 
would  be  latent 
unless  man 
wanted  food 
and  the  earth's 
surface  were 
cultivable. 


those  of  a  weasel.  Greahiess,  then,  is  simply  the  pos- 
session and  exercise  by  such  and  such  a  person,  in 
an  exceptional  degree,  of  some  faculty  or  assortment 
of  faculties,  the  rudiments  of  which  are  possessed  by 
all.  And  the  reason  why  it  is  necessary  to  insist  on 
this  fact  here  is  that,  as  a  consequence  of  it,  the  use 
which  the  great  man  makes  of  his  exceptional 
powers  —  or,  in  other  words,  their  whole  efficient 
existence  —  depends  on  certain  causes  which  are 
relatively,  though  not  absolutely,  similar  to  those 
on  which  depends  the  use  which  the  ordinary  man 
makes  of  his. 

Let  us,  then,  consider  the  powers  of  the  ordinary 
man  first,  and  let  us  take  as  examples  of  them  those 
powers  or  faculties  which  are  most  universally  dis- 
tributed amongst  the  human  race  —  namely,  the 
powers  by  which  the  rudest  populations  obtain 
enough  food  to  live  upon.  Now  such  faculties,  practi- 
cally universal  as  they  are,  would  be  potential  only, 
not  actual,  if  it  were  not  for  two  things.  These  are 
certain  appetites  or  desires,  having  a  physiological 
origin,  on  the  one  hand,  and  the  external  conditions 
on  the  other,  which  make  the  satisfaction  of  those 
appetites,  or  the  fulfilment  of  those  desires,  a  possi- 
bility. Thus  if  men  could  live  without  eating,  and 
had  no  desire  for  food,  those  special  faculties  would 
be  dormant  which  are  now  exercised  in  agriculture ; 
and  this  means  that  for  all  practical  purposes  they 
would  not  exist  at  all.  These  faculties  would  also 
not  exist  at  all,  no  matter  what  men's  desire  for  food 
might  be,  if   the  whole   of   the   earth's   crust   had 


FACULTIES  ACTUALISED  BY  MOTIVE       273 
happened  to  be  cast-iron,  and  if  tillage  were  conse-     b°°'«  ^v 

1       •  Ml  11  1  Chapter! 

quently  impossible,  and  there  were  no  seeds  to  sow. 
In  other  words,  the  very  commonest  and  very 
simplest  faculties  which  human  beings  possess  have 
a  practical  and  a  universal  existence  in  those  beings, 
only  because,  in   the  first   place,  they  minister   to  Thus  the 

exercise  of  the 

universal  wants,  and  because,  in  the  second  place,  simplest  facui- 
the  earth  is  so  constituted  as  to  supply  the  materials  orthe'Jvrm 
on  which  these  faculties  can  operate.     Or,  to  put  the  of  ^o^e  certain 

■C^  '  1^  object,  and  on 

matter  in  more  general  terms,  the  very  commonest  ♦'^^  possibility 

1-1  e         ^    '  -11  ir-  of  attaining  it. 

and  simplest  laculties  are  not  practically  self-existent, 

except  as  mere  barren  potentialities ;  and  as  practical 

forces  they  exist  only  in  the  degree  to  which  they 

are  evoked  by  external  things  and  circumstances  — 

by  some  external  object,  such  as  food,  which  excites 

and  will  satisfy  desire,  and  by  external  circumstances 

which  make  the  object  obtainable. 

Now  if  this  be  true  of  those  faculties  of  the  com-  if  this  is  true 
.....       .  ,  11*111  of  the  com- 

monest kind,  ministering  to  the  needs  which  all  men  monest  facui- 

inevitably  feel  alike,  and  which  they  always  must  afsupplying"" 
feel   so    lono:  as  they  remain  alive,  it  is  yet  more  necessaries, 

Q  J  'J  much  more  is 

obviously  true  of  those  higher  and  rarer  faculties  it  true  of  rare 

*"~^  fi&culties  which 

ministering  to  needs  which  are  so  far  from  being  aim  at  produc- 
inevitable,  that  whole  races  have  existed  and  do  ex-  Auitiesr"^' 
ist  without  any  conscious  knowledge  of  them.  The 
great  inventor,  the  great  director  of  industry,  will  not 
develop  or  use  his  exceptional  latent  faculties  unless 
by  the  use  of  them  he  can  achieve  some  object  which 
he  desires ;  and  this  must  be  something  which  the 
community  has  to  give,  or  the  possession  of  which  it 
will  secure  to  him  if  it  be  something  which  he  himself 
18 


274  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  IV     produces.     Columbus,  for  instance,  as  the  records  of 

Chapter  i       *  .       . 

his  life  show  us,  would  never  have  braved  the  Atlantic 
if  the  society  of  his  time,  though  in  the  end  it  rewarded 
him  ill,  had  not  rendered  an  enormous  reward  both 
in  money  and  rank  possible  —  a  reward  which  he 
specifically  bargained  for  in  the  event  of  his  enter- 
prise being  successful.     And  similarly  in  the  case  of 
Society,  then,   great  mcu  iu  general,  unless  society  is  so  constituted 
Lrftrw^rrin  as  to  rcudcr  some  reward  or  other  the  natural  or 
coSit^d^i  possible  result  of  the  exercise  of  certain  exceptional 
to  make  the     facultics,  and  unless  this  reward  shall  be  one  which 

reward  they 

desire  possible,  the  great  men  shall  think  worth  working  for,  their 
exceptional  faculties  will  remain  potential  only. 
That  is  to  say,  their  faculties  will  be  practically 
non-existent,  and  the  community  will  be  as  helpless 
as  it  would  be  if  it  had  no  great  men  at  all. 

In  so  doing         Now  here  we  have  what  is  virtually  a  genuine  social 

society  uncon-  .  •      i         i  i  t-» 

sciousiy  makes  coutract.  It  IS  uot,  indeed,  such  a  contract  as  Rousseau 
Tract'^witMu  drcamcd  of.  It  was  never  made  deliberately  at  any 
great  men;  period  of  history  by  two  independent  parties  coming 
together  for  the  purpose.  It  was  the  result  of  a 
gradual  and  quite  unconscious  process.  Ordinary 
men,  having  experienced  the  advantages  of  being 
directed  by  great  men,  submitted  instinctively  to 
such  conditions  as  the  great  men  demanded,  and 
instinctively  offered  them,  or  allowed  them  to  retain 
possession  of,  such  rewards  as  were  necessary  to 
stimulate  them  to  further  action.  But  these  proceed- 
ings were  a  bargain,  a  social  contract,  none  the  less, 
although  they  were  not  recognised  as  such ;  and  they 
constitute  a  bargain  still  —  a  bargain  which  is  continu- 


THE   TRUE  SOCIAL    CONTRACT  275 

ally  bein^  renewed,  and  the  terms  of  which  reformers     ^0°^'  'v 

•  11  •  1  T-i  1  •    1'      >         Chapter  I 

are  contmually  trymg  to  alter.  Ihus  the  socialists 
proposal  to  take  from  the  founder  of  a  new  industry 
all  the  wealth  that  his  exceptional  faculties  have 
created,  and  pay  him,  as  they  propose  to  do,  with 
the  paper  money  of  honour,  is  merely  an  attempt  to 
make  a  new  bargain  with  the  great  man,  which  shall 
secure  his  services  on  cheaper  terms  for  the  little 
men.  Similarly,  all  encouragement  offered  to  art 
and  science  by  the  State  is  a  bargain  offered  to  a 
number  of  unknown  persons,  who  are  presumed  to 
be  the  possessors  potentially  of  artistic  and  scientific 
faculties,  the  State  engaging  to  give  them  certain 
opportunities  and  rewards,  if  they  on  their  part  will 
make  their  potential  faculties  actual. 

Now   with    regard   to    this   bargain    or   contract  and  tws  is  a 

,   .    ,         ,  .  ,  ,  1         1  •     contract  which 

which  the  community  has  not  only  made,  but  is  is  being  con- 
always  remaking  and  revising  with  its  great  men,  **^"^^  "^^^"^^  * 
we  must  observe  that  it  is  a  bargain  which,  from  the 
necessities  of  the  case,  is  made  by  the  community 
solely  with  individual  great  men  who  are  living.  It 
is  not  a  bargain  offered  to  the  great  men  of  the  past, 
no  matter  how  much  of  his  greatness  the  living 
great  man  may  owe  to  them.  It  is  impossible  to 
bargain  with  the  dead,  and  therefore  to  the  present 
question  the  claims  of  the  dead  are  as  irrelevant  as 
the  claims  of  protoplasm.  The  present  question  is 
how  shall  such  and  such  living  people  be  induced 
to  develop  certain  superiorities  which  are  latent 
in  them,  or  to  use  to  the  best  advantage  superi- 
orities which  have  been   developed  already.     And 


aye  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  IV     the  answer  depends  on  these  men  themselves.     It 

Chapter  i  '■ 

depends  on  the  characters  which  they  personally 
possess,  and  not  on  the  parents  or  ancestors  from 
whom  their  characters  have  been  derived.  We  can 
no  more  go  behind  the  personality  of  the  great  man 
in  bargaining  with  him,  than  we  can  go  behind  the 
personality  of  the  dipsomaniac  in  attempting  to  cure 
him.  We  may  excuse  the  failing  of  the  latter  as 
something  which  he  has  inherited  from  his  ancestors; 
we  can  cure  it  only  as  something  for  which  he  is 
himself  responsible.  If  civilisation,  therefore,  depends 
The  great  men  on  the  great  man,  no  community  can   become  or 

themselves  are  ...,.,..,.  ... 

the  ultimate     rcmam  Civilised  which  does  not  so  arrange  itself  as 
ownprice!"^"^   to  accord  to  its  liviug  great  men  such  rewards  as 
they  themselves  feel  to  be  a  sufficient  inducement 
firstly  to  develop  their   faculties,  and   secondly  to 
employ  them  to  the  utmost. 
Here  is  the  Hcrc,  thcu,  wc  havc  a  new  and  final  verification 

living  great  of  that  truth  which  has  already  been  established 
Sitionrare  ^gaiust  thc  argumcnts  of  Mr.  Spencer — namely,  that 
^raSS^  the  great  man  is  a  vera  causa  of  progress,  and  that 
involved  in  no  explanation  of  progress  has  any  practical  value 
which  does  not  base  itself  on  an  examination  of  the 
great  man's  character.  And  that  such  is  the  case 
will  become  yet  more  apparent  when  we  take  into 
consideration  the  following  additional  facts,  which 
are  quite  distinct  from  any  we  have  yet  touched 
upon,  and  which  practically  have  an  equal,  or  per- 
haps even  a  superior,  importance. 

If   the    exceptional   faculties   of    the   great   man 
were  so  far  like  the  faculties  possessed  by  all  men, 


progress. 


THE   GREAT  MAN  AT  AN  ADVANTAGE     277 
that  by  lookinor  at  him  we  could  tell  that  he  was  a     ^o"''  ^^ 

<    ,  .  ^  .  f  .      ,  ,  M  Chapter  I 

potential  inventor,  or  organiser  or  industry,  or  philos- 
opher, as  easily  as  by  looking  at  a  common  man  we  These  living 
can  tell  that  he  can  trundle  a  wheelbarrow,  the  entire  masters  of  the 
force  of  the  foregoing  argument  would  be  lost.     The  ^""^"°"' 
community  would  then  know  what  each  great  man 
could  do  for  it,  and  could  force  him  to  do  it  by 
flogging  or  starving  him  if  he  refused.    The  ordinary 
faculties —  the  faculties  of  manual  labour  —  can  be 
made  to  exert  themselves  precisely  in  this  way.     A 
large  number  of  the  great  works  of  antiquity  were 
due  to  labour  successfully  stimulated  by  the  whip. 
But  it  is  only  a  man's  commonest  faculties  that  can 
be  called  into  action  thus ;  and  they  can  be  called 
into  action  thus  only  for  this  reason  —  that  those  who 
coerce  him  know  that  these  faculties  are  possessed 
by  him,  and  they  also  know  the  task  which  they 
wish  to  make  him  accomplish.     But  in  the  case  of 
the  great  man  both  these  conditions  are  wanting. 
It  is  impossible  to  tell  that  he  possesses  any  excep- 
tional faculties  till  he  himself  chooses  to  show  them  ;  because  no 
and  until  circumstances  supply  him  with  some  motive  that  they  have 
for  exercising  them,  he  will  probably  be  hardly  aware  pg^^J'^'g^Jf 
that  he  possesses  such  faculties  himself.     Moreover,  ^Y^  "^^^^^^ '° 

*■  .  show  them. 

even  if  he  gives  the  world  some  reason  to  suspect 
their  existence,  the  world  will  still  not  know  what 
he  can  do  with  them,  and  will  consequently  not  be 
able  to  impose  on  him  any  task  until  he  himself 
chooses  to  show  of  what  he  is  capable.  Any  farmer 
by  looking  at  Burns  could  have  told  that  he  had  the 
makings  of  a  ploughman  in  him,  and  have  forced 


278 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  IV 
Chapter  i 


They  cannot, 
therefore,  be 
coerced  from 
without,  like 
ordinary 
workers. 


They  must  be 
induced  to 
work  by  a 
reward 


him,  under  certain  circumstances,  to  do  so  much 
ploughing  daily;  but  no  one  could  have  told  that 
he  was  a  poet  if  he  had  not  of  his  own  free  will 
revealed  the  fact  to  the  public ;  and  even  when  the 
public  were  aware  of  it,  no  one  could  have  forced 
him  to  compose  The  Cotter  s  Saturday  Night.  A 
press-gang  could  have  turned  Columbus  into  a 
common  sailor,  but  not  all  the  sovereigns  of  Europe 
could  have  forced  him  to  discover  a  new  hemisphere. 
On  the  contrary,  it  was  he  who  had  to  force  sover- 
eigns into  the  reluctant  belief  that  possibly  there 
was  a  new  hemisphere  to  discover.  The  great  man, 
therefore,  is  lord  of  his  exceptional  faculties  in  a  way 
in  which  the  common  man  is  not  lord  of  his  common 
faculties.  The  existence  of  the  latter  faculties  can- 
not be  concealed ;  the  kind  of  work  that  can  be 
accomplished  by  them  is  known  to  everybody ;  and 
therefore  the  community  by  the  exercise  of  mere 
force  can  command  the  average  man,  and  make  him 
work  like  an  animal.  But  over  the  exceptional 
faculties  of  the  great  man  it  has  no  command  what- 
ever, except  what  the  great  man  gives  it;  for  it 
neither  knows  that  the  faculties  exist,  nor  what  things 
the  faculties  can  do,  until  the  great  man  elects  to 
reveal  the  secret.  He  cannot  be  made  to  reveal 
it,  he  can  only  be  induced  to  do  so ;  and  he  can  be 
induced  to  do  so  only  by  a  community  which  offers 
to  exceptional  faculties  some  assured  and  exceptional 
reward,  just  as  a  reward  is  offered  for  evidence 
against  an  unknown  murderer.  Moreover,  just  as 
in  the  latter  case  it  very  often  happens  that  the  re- 


THE   GREAT  MAN'S  TERMS  279 

ward  originally  offered  has  to  be  raised  several  times     ^°°i'  ^^ 

'->  J  ...  .  Chapter  i 

before  a  sum  is  reached  which  will  induce  the  witness 
to  come  forward,  so  must  any  community,  as  the 
condition  of  becoming  civilised,  raise  the  rewards  of  ^^'ch  they 

,  r  ^  ^  r  themselves  feel 

greatness  to  such  a  figure  that  the  possessors  of  to  be  sufficient. 
latent  superiorities  will  be  induced  to  develop  and 
use  them.  And  hence  the  great  man  not  only  causes 
progress  by  what  he  does,  but  he  influences  also  the 
entire  structure  of  society,  by  his  character,  which 
regulates  the  terms  on  which  he  will  consent  to 
do  it. 

This  is  the  point  at  which  the  science  of  sociology  "^"^^  ^^^ 

.  .  .  great  man's 

primarily  comes  in  contact  with  the  practical  prob-  character  and 
lems  of   to-day.     That  all   progress  is  due  to  the  [m'jJiesTthem. 
efforts  of   the  superior  minority  is  a  truth  which,  J,^^'^"^°^ 'J* 
taken  by  itself,  and  apart  from  other  truths  allied  to  it,  society. 
we  can  merely  recognise  and  assent  to.     We  can  do 
nothing  to  alter  it;  nor  will  the  fact  of  our  recognis- 
ing it,  if  taken  by  itself,  tend  to  alter  or  guide  our 
conduct.     We  are  not  even  able  to  settle  the  number 
of  males  and  females  which  shall  be  produced  in 
each  family.     Still  less  can  we  settle  or  increase  the 
number  of   individuals  who   shall   bring   into    the 
world  with  them  talents  more  than  ordinary.     But 
though  no  community  can  do  anything  to  settle  or 
alter  the  per  centage  of  potential  greatness  that  will 
be  born  into  it  from  generation  to  generation,  it  can 
'settle  or  alter  the  social  conditions  and  rewards  by 
means  of  which  this   potential  greatness  shall    be 
developed  and   enabled   to   use    itself;    and  a  very 
large  part,  though  not  the  whole,  of  political  wisdom 


28o  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  IV     ^fii  thus  consist  in  arranging  these  conditions  and 

Chapter  i  i  •    i 

rewards,  so  that  from  each  potentially  great  man, 
whatever  degree  or  kind  of  potentiality  may  be  his, 
the  community  may  elicit  the  highest  and  most  far- 
reaching  efforts  of  which  he  is  capable.  It  will,  of 
course,  be  to  the  interest  of  the  community  to  secure 
this  result  by  offering  the  great  man  the  smallest 
and  least  costly  reward,  the  desire  of  which  will 
induce  him  to  develop  and  exert  himself  to  the 
utmost ;  but  the  ultimate  fixer  of  the  great  man's 
price — let  it  once  again  be  said  —  is  not  the  com- 
munity, but  the  great  man  himself. 
This  is  what         \\_   {^   this  sociological    and    psychological    truth 

socialists  con-  "  ^■'  *-'  . 

stantiy  forget,  that  cvcn  the  clearest-headcd  amongst  the  socialists 
are  continually  forgetting.  They  perceive  it  at  one 
moment,  at  the  next  moment  they  entirely  forget 
it,  and  solemnly  proceed  to  build  up  their  visionary 
polity  on  foundations  which  their  own  arguments 
had  previously  condemned.  A  curious  example  of 
this  "  inability,''  as  Mr.  Spencer  calls  it,  "  io  com- 
prehend assembled  propositions  in  their  totality  "  is 
to  be  found  in  a  remarkable  passage  by  Mr.  Sidney 
Webb.  Having  observed  that  "-socialists  would 
nationalise  both  rent  and  interest  by  the  State  becom- 
ing the  sole  landowner  and  capitalist''  he  goes  on  to 
acknowledge  that  great  fundamental  fact  which  it  is 
the  main  object  of  the  present  work  to  elucidate. 
"  Such  an  arrangement,  however^'  he  says,  "  would 
leave  untotiched  the  third  monopoly,  —  the  largest  of 
them  all,  —  the  monopoly  of  bzisiness  ability."  In 
these    last  words    he   appears   to  be  like  a  Daniel 


RECKONING    WITHOUT  THE  HOST         281 
come  to  iudsfinent     He  recognises  in  the  fact  that     Bookiv 

1         r  1  .1  1  r    r  1    .  i  Chapter  I 

the  few  have  a  natural  monopoly  of  faculties,  the 
exercise  of   which  is    required  for  the   progressive  and  they 
well-being  of  all,  a  genuine  and  a  formidable  diffi-  equalise  ° 
culty  in  the  way  of  the  realisation  of  socialism;  but  Xing  gLaf 
now  comes  the  passaere  for  the  sake  of  which  these  ""en  any  ex- 

••■  '-'  ceptional 

others  have  been  quoted.  Great  as  this  difficulty  reward, 
is,  he  tells  us,  "  the  more  recent  socialists "  have 
devised  a  way  for  getting  over  it.  And  what  does 
the  reader  think  this  way  is  }  It  has  at  all  events 
the  merit  of  being  very  simple.  "  The  more  recent 
socialists,''  says  Mr.  Webb,  "  attack  this  third  monop- 
oly also  by  allotting  to  every  worker  an  equal  wage, 
whatever  may  be  the  nature  of  his  work'' 

It   has  been  thought  worth  while  to  quote  Mr.  They  forget  to 
Sidney  Webb  because  he  is  an  exceptionally  favour- under  these' 
able  specimen  of  the  modern  socialistic  theoriser.    It  g/eal  m'ln"''"' 
is  therefore  interestins:  to  notice  the  hiatus  that  here  ^°"'^  exercise 

'--'  or  reveal 

yawns  in  his  argument.  The  entire  question  which  their  excep- 
is  really  at  issue  is  begged  by  him.  His  allies,  hcataii. 
tells  us,  though  they  cannot  destroy  the  monopoly 
which  the  few  possess  of  exceptional  business 
powers,  will  destroy  the  effects  of  this  monopoly  by 
taking  away  from  the  few  nearly  all  the  wealth  that 
their  exceptional  powers  produce.  It  never  seems  to 
occur  to  him  to  ask  whether,  under  these  circum- 
stances, the  few  would  develop  or  exercise  their 
exceptional  powers  at  all.  And  yet  the  whole 
problem  for  him,  as  a  socialist,  lies  here,  and  lies 
nowhere  else.  For  from  the  very  fact  that  these 
powers  are  admittedly  a  monopoly  of  the  few,  it  is 


282 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  IV 
Chapter  i 


Exceptional 
rewards  are 
essential  to 
exceptional 
action. 


evident  that  their  existence  cannot  be  assumed  in 
anybody  unless  he  exerts  himself  to  give  some  sign 
of  their  presence.  External  authority,  therefore,  can 
compel  nobody  to  use  them  who  does  not  put  himself 
at  the  mercy  of  the  authorities  by  letting  them  know 
he  has  them ;  and  thus  "  the  more  recent  socialists,''' 
in  attacking  "  the  third  and  greatest  monopoly''  are 
really  themselves  at  the  mercy  of  the  very  monopo- 
lists whom  they  propose  to  attack.  It  is  true  that  if  a 
socialistic  revolution  could  be  brought  about  suddenly, 
existing  great  men  known  to  have  certain  talents, 
which  had  been  already  developed  and  exercised 
under  conditions  which  the  revolution  destroyed, 
might  be  seized  on  by  the  State,  in  its  capacity  of 
universal  employer,  and  forced  to  continue  some- 
thing of  their  former  voluntary  activity  by  threats  of 
torture  or  some  similar  method  of  coercion.  But 
even  granting  this  to  be  possible,  it  would  only  solve 
the  problem  for  a  moment ;  for  as  these  men  died  — 
and  some  of  them  would  be  dying  daily —  new  talent 
would  be  wanted  to  take  the  place  of  the  old ;  and 
though  the  State  might  coerce  such  talent  as  was 
already  developed,  it  could  not  by  coercion  secure 
the  services  of  the  new,  because  threats  of  coercion 
would  never  tempt  new  talent  to  discover  itself,  but 
would,  on  the  contrary,  drive  it  yet  deeper  beneath 
the  surface. 

Exceptional  potentialities  can  be  called  out  and 
realised  only  by  a  kind  of  action  which  is  the  very 
antithesis  of  coercion,  and  which  is  analogous  to 
that   of    sunshine   on   buds,   or    flowers   or    fruits 


WHAT  THE   GREAT  MAN  ASKS  FOR        283 

—  namely,  the  penetrating,  the  warming,  the  stimu-  ^°°^  '^ 
lating  action  of  the  hope  of  certain  personal  advan- 
tages on  the  mind  of  the  exceptional  man,  which 
advantages  he  will  not  only  covet  as  advanta- 
geous, but  will  recognise  as  the  natural  result  of 
the  exercise  of  his  exceptional  faculties,  and  as  a 
result  attainable  by  the  exercise  of  these  faculties  we  must  in- 

1  iTTi  1  11  1        quire  what  the 

only.  What  these  personal  advantages  are,  the  required 
desire  of  which,  coupled  with  their  attainability,  is  rewSare. 
necessary  to  stimulate  men  who  have  more  than 
ordinary  potentialities,  to  do  greater  things  by 
developing  them  than  are  done  by  ordinary  men, 
must  be  determined  by  reference  to  the  actual  facts 
of  life,  the  records  of  which  are  ample,  and  the 
details  of  which,  though  numerous,  can  by  careful 
analysis  be  easily  reduced  to  order. 


CHAPTER    II 

THE    MOTIVES    OF   THE    EXCEPTIONAL   WEALTH- 
PRODUCER 


Socialists, 
though  often 
forgetting  the 
necessity  of 
exceptional 
motive,  often 
remember  it. 


and  endeavour 
to  show  that 
socialistic 
society  would 
have  sufficient 
rewards  to 
offer  to  its 
great  men, 


In  spite  of  their  frequent  forgetfulness  of  the  fact 
just  insisted  on,  that  the  development  and  exer- 
cise of  exceptional  faculties  can  be  secured  only 
through  the  influence  of  some  exceptional  motive, 
this  is  not  a  fact  which  socialists  theoretically 
deny.  On  the  contrary,  often  as  they  forget  it,  with 
curious  consequences  to  their  reasoning,  yet  just  as 
often,  when  they  happen  to  be  directly  confronted 
with  it,  they  are  loud  in  declaring  that  they  recognise 
it  quite  as  clearly  as  their  opponents;  and  a  consider- 
able portion  of  their  more  modern  writings  consists 
of  a  setting  forth  of  the  various  exceptional  rewards 
which  will,  according  to  them,  in  the  socialistic  State, 
elicit  from  exceptional  men  the  exercise  of  their 
utmost  powers.  Moreover,  the  rewards  on  which 
the  socialists  principally  insist  are  rewards,  the  desire 
of  which  is  admitted  by  all  parties  to  be  an  actual 
force  in  society  as  at  present  constituted,  and  in  fact 
to  have  been,  ever  since  the  dawn  of  history,  the 
motive  to  which  much  activity  of  the  highest  kind 

a84 


SOCIALISTS   ON  MOTIVE  285 

has  been  due.     These  rewards  have  been  defined  in     boouiv 

Chapter  2 

a  recent  Handbook  of  Socialism  as  the  pleasure  of 

"  excelling''''  "  the  joy  in  creative  work'''  the  satisfac-  such  as  the 

.  ,  ,      .  ...  pleasure  of 

tion  which  work  for  others  brings   to  ""the  instincts  excelling,  of 
of  benevolence','  and,  lastly,  "  social  approval''  or  the  and"of^receiv- 
homage  which  is  called  "  honour':  ing honour. 

If  the  socialists,  however,  confined  themselves  to 
maintaining  that  the  desire  of  such  rewards  as  these 
constitutes  a  sufBcient  motive  to  exceptional  activity 
of  certain  kinds,  they  would  not  only  be  asserting 
what  nobody  else  would  deny,  but  they  would  be 
putting  forward  nothing  which,  as  socialists,  it  is 
their  interest  to  assert.  The  ultimate  proposition 
which,  as  socialists,  they  aim  at  establishing  is  not 
that  certain  kinds  of  exceptional  men  do  certain 
kinds  of  exceptional  things,  in  obedience  to  the 
motives  in  question  ;  but  that  because  some  excep-  The  funda- 

.   ,  .  mental  ques- 

tional   men,   endowed  with    certain    temperaments,  tion  is,  win 

are  motived  by  them  to  activities  of  certain  specific  ^^the'sT^"^  ' 

kinds,   other  exceptional   men  will  be  motived  by  ^'^^'^^^ 

'  J-  -'    great  men  to 

them  with  equal  certainty  to  other  activities  of  a  weaith-pro- 

.  duction? 

kind  totally  different  —  and  more  especially  to  the 
activities  which  result  in  the  production  of  wealth. 

Here  is  the  fundamental  point  on  which  the 
socialists  join  issues  with  their  opponents.  Their 
opponents,  they  say,  assume  that  the  sole  reward 
or  advantage,  the  desire  of  which  will  stimulate  the 
monopolists  of  "  business  ability  "  to  exert  that 
ability  in  the  production  and  augmentation  of 
wealth,  is  a  share  of  wealth  for  themselves  propor- 
tionate   to    the    amount    produced    by   them  —  an 


286  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  IV     amount  which  will  separate  their  lot  from   that  of 

Chapter  2  ,       ,  .       ^ 

the  majority  of  their  fellows.  Now  if  this  should 
be  really  the  case,  as  the  socialists  are  coming  to 
perceive,  the  fact  would  be  fatal  to  the  entire  ideal 
of  socialism.  They  are  consequently  now  directing 
the  best  of  their  ingenuity  to  showing  that  the 
Is  the  enjoy-    desirc  of  DOSsessinsT  exceptional  wealth  is  altosrether 

ment  of  excep-  ^  .  .  . 

tionai  wealth  supcrfluous  as  a  motive  for  producing  it,  and  that 
as  a  motive  to  the  great  producers  of  it,  when  all  chance  of  possess- 
producingit?    '^^g  -^  j^  taken  from  them,  will  find  in  the  pleasures 

of  the  strain  which  the  productive  process  neces- 
sitates —  especially  if  these  are  supplemented  by 
the  inexpensive  thanks  of  the  community  —  a  more 
powerful  inducement  to  exertion  than  is  the  pros- 
pect of  the  largest  fortune. 
If  it  is  so,  it  is       Now    in    endeavouring   to    make    this    peculiar 

for  the  social-  ..  !••  •  ^  ^  ^        ^  i  r  r 

ists  to  prove  position  good,  it  IS  cvident  that  the  burden  of  proof 
'°'  lies  with  the  socialists  themselves;  for  although  the 
doctrine  that  all  exceptional  exertions  in  wealth- 
production  are  motived  solely  by  an  avidity  for 
exceptional  wealth  as  such  —  and  this  is  the  doctrine 
which  the  socialists  set  themselves  to  controvert  —  is 
a  very  imperfect  rendering  of  what  their  opponents 
actually  maintain,  it  embodies  an  assertion  which 
the  socialists  themselves  declare  to  have  been  true  of 
all  exceptional  exertion  in  wealth-production  hitherto. 
No  one  declares  this  more  passionately  and  more 
persistently  than  they.  For  what,  as  political 
agitators,  has  been  their  chief  moral  indictment 
against  the  typical  great  men  of  industry  —  the 
organisers   of     labour,    the     introducers     of     new 


PR  OD  UCTION  AND  DESIRE  OF  THE  PRODUCT    287 
machinery,  the  pioneers  of  commerce  ?     Their  chief     ^^0°^  ^^ 

1     •      1  •  1  1  1  •  1  1  Chapter  2 

moral  indictment   has  been  this :    that  these  men, 

instead  of   labourino^   for   their   fellows,  or  for  the  ^°y  ^^^^  !^^.'"' 

o  '  selves  admit 

sake  of  any  of  those  rewards  which  the  socialists  that  u  has  not 

.    f    .  .  ,  .        ,  been  so  in  the 

declare  to  be  so  satisfying,  have  been  motived  past,  and  is  not 
solely  by  the  passion  of  selfish  "greed."  Its  hideous  nowf  ^^° 
influence,  they  say,  is  as  old  as  civilisation  itself,  and 
the  *'  monopolists  of  business  ability "  in  Tyre  and 
Sidon  were  as  much  its  creatures  as  are  their 
modern  representatives  in  Chicago.  And  this  asser- 
tion, unlike  many  made  by  the  socialists,  has  the 
merit  of  being,  so  far  as  it  goes,  true.  Greed,  of 
course,  is  a  word  which,  in  addition  to  its  direct 
meaning,  carries  with  it  an  accretion  of  moral  in- 
sult ;  but  putting  aside  this,  it  means  in  the  present 
connection  merely  a  desire  on  the  part  of  the  great 
wealth-producer  to  enjoy  an  amount  of  wealth  pro- 
portionate to  the  amount  produced  by  him:  and 
from  the  dawn  of  civilisation  up  to  the  present  time 
all  great  wealth-producers,  whether  merchants,  manu- 
facturers, or  inventors,  have  had  the  desire  of  enjoy- 
ing such  wealth  as  their  motive.  The  desire  has 
been  connected  with  the  activity  just  as  universally 
and  closely  as  the  desire  of  water  is  connected  with 
the  act  of  drinking  it,  or  the  desire  of  winning  a 
woman  with  the  act  of  making  love  to  her.  If  the 
socialists,  then,  would  persuade  us  that  a  motive  so 
universal  as  this  can  be  now  superseded  by  others  of 
an  entirely  opposite  character,  they  can  do  so  only 
by  adducing  the  clearest  evidence  that,  on  the  one 
hand,  this  motive  itself  is  losing  its  old  power,  and 


288 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  IV 
Chapter  2 

Are  there  any 
signs,  then, 
that  the  desire 
for  exceptional 
wealth  is 
beginning  to 
lose  its  power  ? 


We  shall  find 
that  the 
socialists 
themselves 
maintain  just 
the  contrary ; 


that  other  motives,  on  the  other  hand,  are  actually 
acquiring  and  exercising  it. 

Let  us  first,  then,  consider  the  passion  of  greed 
itself,  and  ask  whether  there  is  anything  in  its  con- 
nection with  wealth-production  hitherto  which  may 
lead  us  to  think  that  in  spite  of  its  universality  in 
the  past,  it  is  merely  a  transitory  propensity  from 
which  exceptional  men  will  free  themselves,  instead 
of  being  a  propensity  rooted  in  the  very  constitution 
of  human  nature. 

And  here  again  the  socialists  will  be  amongst 
our  most  important  witnesses;  for  just  as  they, 
of  all  writers  and  thinkers,  have  done  most  to  call 
attention  to  the  fact  that  up  to  the  present  time 
greed  has  been  the  main  motive  by  which  the 
exceptional  wealth-producers  have  been  actuated,  so 
they,  of  all  writers  and  thinkers,  have  done  most  to 
call  attention  to  another  fact  as  well,  which  shows 
the  motive  in  question  to  be  as  permanent  as  it 
is  universal.  For  that  very  desire  of  the  producer  to 
possess  what  he  himself  produces,  which,  when  found 
in  the  exceptional  man,  they  denounce  as  greed, 
and  which  they  tell  us  that  the  exceptional  man  will 
get  rid  of  in  the  course  of  a  year  or  two,  is  the  very 
desire  which,  as  existing  in  the  common  man,  they 
have  assumed  to  be  the  foundation  of  his  whole 
industrial  character ;  and  to  it  have  all  their  most 
fervid  and  powerful  appeals  been  made.  The 
socialists,  in  their  attempts  to  excite  the  masses 
against  the  existing  order,  have  relied  less  on 
rhetorical  declarations  that  the  labouring  man  gets 


THE  PRODUCER'S  RIGHT  TO  HIS  PRODUCTS     289 

very  little,  than  on  the  quasi-scientific  assertion  that     ^^°\l^^ 

he  gets  less  than  he  produces,  and  that  consequently 

the   wealth    of   his    employers    is    merely  his    own  f°^  ^^^y  appeal 

.  ^  7   7       •         7  *°  ^^^  desire  of 

wealth   stolen  from   him.      '^  All  wealth  is  due  /(?  each  producer 
labour;  therefore  to  the  labourer  all  wealth  is  due  "  h°e  prod"ce^s  as 
has  formed  from  the  first,  and  still  forms,  the  text  JJ'^^jJ^^'Jj  ^^^ 
from    which    the    socialists    always    preach    when  permanent 

•'         *■  desire  in  man; 

addressing  the  labouring  classes ;  and  the  use  of 
this  text  as  the  watchword  of  popular  agitation  is 
obviously  an  admission  that,  as  a  producing  agent, 
man  is  motived  so  exclusively  by  the  desire  to 
possess  what  he  produces,  or  else  its  fair  equivalent, 
that  he  naturally  resents  the  idea  of  producing  any- 
thing merely  in  order  that  others  may  take  it  away 
from  him.  Indeed,  this  doctrine  that  the  desire  for 
the  product,  and  the  producer's  sense  that  he  has 
a  right  to  it,  form  the  only  motive  for  production 
possible  for  a  free  man,  formed  the  unquestioned 
basis  of  the  entire  socialistic  psychology  so  long  as 
the  theory  of  Marx  was  held  by  the  socialists  to  be 
unassailable,  according  to  which  wealth  was  the 
product  of  average  labour,  and  the  common  or 
average  labourer  was  the  sole  true  producer.  It 
was  only  as  time  went  on,  and  the  socialists  were  and  never 

•'  •  1         f  1  questioned 

slowly  compelled  to   recognise  the  few  to  be  pro-  this  so  long  as 
ducers   of  wealth   just  as   truly  as   the   many,  that  Iha? the Toie 
the  socialists  began  their  attempts  to  get  rid  of  the  PhetSur"^" 
doctrine  which  a  very  little  while  ago  they  regarded 
as  axiomatic —  the  doctrine  that  each  producer  has 
a  right  to  his  own  products,  and  that  his  hope  of 
possessing  it  is  his  principal  motive  for  its  produc- 
19 


290 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  IV 
Chapter  2 

They  ques- 
tioned the  doc- 
trine only  when 
they  came  to 
see  that  the 
great  man  is  a 
producer  also ; 
and  they  con- 
fine their 
questioning  to 
his  case. 


But  if  the 
labourer 
desires  to 
possess  what 
he  produces, 
much  more 
will  the  great 
man  do  so ; 


tlon.  In  making  these  attempts,  however,  they 
have,  with  a  judicious  eclecticism,  been  content  to 
apply  them  to  the  exceptional  man  only ;  and  the 
common  man  and  his  motives  they  leave  undis- 
turbed, except  when  they  venture  on  the  doctrine 
that  the  common  man's  motive  for  production  will 
in  the  future  be  the  desire  of  possessing,  not  only 
all  that  he  produces,  but  all  that  he  produces  and  a 
great  deal  else  besides. 

If,  then,  it  is  unlikely  that  this  desire  to  possess 
the  product  will  cease  to  be  operative  as  the  motive 
to  production  amongst  the  masses,  that  it  will  cease 
to  be  operative  amongst  the  few  is  more  unlikely 
still ;  for  the  man  who  is  possessed  of  average 
powers  only  cannot  hope  to  produce  more  than  the 
average  man  requires,  and  his  object  in  producing 
tends  to  represent  itself  to  his  mind  in  terms  of 
the  comfort  which  he  hopes  to  experience,  rather 
than  in  terms  of  the  value  of  products  which  he 
hopes  to  possess.  But  the  exceptional  man, 
whose  peculiarity  as  a  producer  is  this,  that  he 
produces  not  only  as  much  as  the  average  man 
requires,  but  an  indefinite  amount  in  addition  to 
it,  is  constantly  balancing  his  products  not  with 
his  immediate  wants,  but  with  the  amount  of 
intellectual  effort  which  he  has  expended  in  the 
process  of  production.  Indeed,  the  more  closely  we 
consider  the  matter,  the  more  strongly  we  shall  be 
convinced  that  the  desire  of  possessing  wealth  pro- 
portionate to  the  amount  produced  by  them  becomes 
as  a  motive    to  production    stronger  in  men,   not 


MUNIFICENCE  AND  DESIRE   OF   WEALTH     291 

weaker,  in   exact    proportion    as    their   productive     ^^^^ 
powers  are  great,  and  the  amount  produced  by  them 
appeals    to   their    intellects    rather    than    to   their 
necessities. 

So  far,  then,  as  a  study  of  this  motive  itself  can 
inform  us,  the  socialistic  idea  that  it  will  ever  cease  to 
be  paramount  has  no  foundation  whatever,  and  is  con- 
tradicted even  by  the  socialists  themselves.  The  only 
fact  connected  with  this  motive  directly  which  wears 
so  much  as  a  semblance  of  serious  evidence  in  their 
favour  is  the  fact  often  dwelt  on  by  emotional  writers 
like  Mr.  Kidd,  that  many  men  who  have  made  enor- 
mous fortunes  have  given  away  a  large  part  of  them 
for  what  he  calls  "  altruistic  "  purposes ;  and  writers 
of  the  kind  in  question  take  this  fact  for  evidence  ^o""  even  if  he 

,  ,  ,       .  ,  .  II'  •  Sives  away 

that  the  desire  of  possessmg  great  wealth  is  ceasing  what  he  pro- 
to  be  the  motive  for  producing  it.  But  those  who  desTres  to 
allow  themselves  to  argue  thus,  show  a  curious  p°^^"*  '*  *^"^ 
carelessness  in  their  examination  of  human  action  ; 
for  the  fact  referred  to,  so  far  as  it  proves  anything, 
negatives  rather  than  supports  the  conclusion  they 
seek  to  draw  from  it.  It  is  perfectly  true  that 
many  men  of  great  industrial  ability  have  produced 
large  fortunes  and  given  them  away  afterwards. 
But  in  order  to  give,  a  man  must  first  possess  ;  and 
it  is  in  the  act  of  giving  magnificently  for  some 
specified  purpose  that  many  men  most  fully  realise 
the  power  with  which  wealth  endows  them.  Thus  the 
fact  that  many  men  will  produce  in  order  that  they 
may  have  the  delight  of  giving  is  no  more  a  proof 
that  they  would  produce  under  the  regime  of  social- 


292  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  IV     ism,  which  would  aim  at  depriving  them  of  anythino: 

Chapter  a  '  •  i  i         r  i 

that  they  might  possibly  give,  than  the  fact  that  a 
man  would  with  pleasure  give  five  shillings  to  a 
beggar  is  a  proof  that  he  would  be  equally  pleased  if 
the  beggar  were  to  pick  his  pocket.  Even  the  men 
who  produce  wealth  —  and  no  doubt  there  are  such 
—  without  any  conscious  sense  that  they  produce  it 
because  of  their  desire  to  possess  it,  would  show 
that  such  was  their  motive  by  their  instinctive  and 
indignant  refusal  to  go  on  producing  it,  if  they  knew 
that  it  would  be  forcibly  taken  from  them. 
There  is  no         And  now,  siucc  wc  have  seen  that  "greed"  as  a 

sign,  therefore,  .  i    i  i  •  i  •  i 

that  the  desire  motivc  to  wcaitli-production  shows  no  mternal  ten- 
weahMs^iosilig  dcncy  to  lose  its  old  efficiency,  let  us  turn  to  those 
force  as  a        other  motivcs  which  the   socialists   tell  us  are  to 

motive. 

supersede  it,  and  ask  whether  there  is  anything  in 
their  known  operations  hitherto  which  indicates  that 
in  the  domain  of  wealth-production  they  will  acquire 
an  efficiency  similar  to  it.  This  is  not  an  inquiry 
which  is  very  difficult  to  pursue,  for  the  motives  in 
question  are  of  a  very  familiar  kind,  and  the  kinds 
of  activity  which  they  have  produced  hitherto  are 
notorious. 
Are,  then.  What  thcse   motivcs   are   has    been   sufficiently 

other  desires  ,  ^    ■' 

acquiring  new  sliown  already  in  language  borrowed  from  the  social- 
motfvesto  istic  wHtcrs  themselves — the  pleasure  of  ''excelling,'' 
duction"^?""  the  ''joy  in  crealive  work''  the  pleasure  of  doing  good 
to  others,  and,  lastly,  the  enjoyment  of  the  approba- 
tion of  others,  or  of  the  yet  more  flattering  tribute 
commonly  called  "  honour."  Now  these  motives,  it 
will  be  seen,  are  of  two  distinct  kinds,  the  first  three 


SCOPE    OF  THE  LOFTIER  MOTIVES         293 
beins:  based   exclusively  on  some  pleasurable  con-     ^°°^  ^^ 

.    .  .  ...  Chapter  2 

dition  of   mind,  which  is  mdependent  of  anybody 

except  the  individual  who  actually  experiences  it ;  Are  the  joys  of 

,  ,  ,      .  ,  ,  ,  ,  ,  ...  excelling,  or  of 

the  two  last  bemg  based  on  a  pleasurable  condition  benefiting 
of  mind,  which  is  directly  dependent  on  the  actions  bling\on° 
*  or  the  attitude  of  other  people.     We  may  therefore  o^j-^d  by  others 

^       ^  J  doing  so  ? 

reduce  these  motives  to  two  —  namely,  self-realisa- 
tion, in  the  first  place,  and  recognition  by  others,  in 
the  second.  This  classification  will  be  not  only 
shorter,  but  more  comprehensive  than  the  other; 
for  self-realisation  will  include  not  only  the  joys  of 
self-improvement  and  artistic  creation,  but  those  of 
the  pursuit  of  truth  and  the  performance  of  religious 
duty,  and  will  distinguish  the  pleasure  of  doing 
good  to  others  from  the  pleasure  of  being  thanked 
or  praised  for  it. 

And   now  let  us  consider  what    those    kinds   of  The  desire  of 

,  .    .  .         ,  .  .  f.        .  .    .    these  joys  is  a 

exceptional  activity  are,  in  the  production  oi  which  motive  to 
one  or  other  of   these  motives,  or   both   of   them,  orexreptTonli 
have  played,  hitherto,  any  considerable  part.     We  «=o"'^"=^ 
shall  find  them  to  be  as  follows:    heroic  conduct 
in  battle,  or  in  the  face  of  any  exceptional  danger ; 
artistic  creation ;   the  pursuit  of  speculative  truth ; 
what  theologians  call  works  of  mercy;  and,  lastly, 
the  propagation  of  religion.     This  list,  if  understood 
in  its  full  sense,  is  exhaustive. 

Now  of  these  five  kinds  of  action  we  may  dismiss  it  >s  a  motive 

,         ,  .  ...  .  .      ,  to  benevolent 

the  last  rrom  our  consideration,  not  because  it  has  action  and 
not  a  most  important  influence  on  civilisation,  but  ''^^'e'ouswor  ; 
because  it  has  no  direct  connection  with  any  of  the 
processes  of  wealth-production,  except  in  so  far  as  it 


294 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  IV 

Chapter  2 


but  neither  of 
these  are  the 
same  thing  as 
wealth-produc- 
tion. 


It  is  a  motive 
to  artistic  pro- 
duction, 
certainly, 


tends  to  divert  men's  attention  from  them.  And  with 
regard  to  the  works  of  mercy  something  similar 
must  be  said  also;  for  though  they  undoubtedly 
have  a  close  connection  with  wealth,  they  do  not 
aid  at  its  production,  still  less  at  its  increase,  but 
merely  at  the  distribution  of  portions  of  it,  which  have 
been  produced  already,  amongst  persons  whom  it 
would  otherwise  not  reach.  The  love  for  others,  for 
example,  by  which  works  of  mercy  are  motived,  may 
prompt  a  man  to  send  London  children  for  a  holiday 
into  the  country  by  train,  but  it  would  never  have 
prompted  him  to  invent  the  locomotive  engine.  It 
may  prompt  him  to  secure  for  a  youth  an  education  in 
modern  science,  but  it  would  never  have  prompted 
him  to  write  the  treatises  of  Professor  Huxley.  All 
activity  of  this  kind,  then,  whatever  form  it  may  take, 
is,  in  a  sociological  sense,  essentially  parasitic.  It 
implies  the  previous  exercise  of  another  set  of 
faculties  totally  distinct  from  those  directly  implied 
in  itself,  and,  together  with  other  faculties,  other 
motives  belonging  to  them.  It  has,  then,  with  the 
actual  process  of  wealth  production  as  little  to  do 
as  has  religious  propagandism  itself ;  and,  like  relig- 
ious propagandism,  we  may  dismiss  it  from  our  con- 
sideration here.  The  only  forms  of  activity  with 
which  we  are  called  on  to  deal  with  here  will  thus 
be  artistic  creation,  the  pursuit  of  speculative  truth, 
and  military  or  quasi-military  feats  of  heroism. 

As  to  artistic  creation,  it  is,  no  doubt,  perfectly 
true,  as  is  proved  by  the  efforts  of  countless  de- 
voted amateurs,  that  men  with  artistic  powers  will 


MOTIVE    OF  SCIENTIFIC  DISCOVERY       295 

often  do  their  utmost  to  develop  them,  merely  for  ^^°\l^ 
the  sake  of  the  pleasure  which  the  exercise  of  these 
powers  brings  with  it;  whilst  literature  is  even 
more  obviously  than  painting  cultivated  by  men 
who  devote  themselves  to  it  solely  as  a  means  of  self- 
expression.  Indeed,  it  might  reasonably  be  contended 
that  finer  books  and  paintings  would  be  produced  if 
it  were  impossible  for  painters  and  writers  to  make 
money  by  producing  them,  than  are  now  produced 
with  a  view  to  captivating  the  public  purchaser. 

So,  too,  the  pursuit  of  scientific  and  philosophic  and  also  to 

,,  ...  .  ,1  ,       "  scientific  dis- 

truth  —  arduous  though  it  is  —  is  generally  under- covery; 
taken  by  men  whose  principal  motive  is  the  pleasure 
their  work  brings  them. 

A  watcher  of  the  skies, 
When  some  new  planet  swims  into  his  ken, 

may  well  be  supposed  to  find  in  that  thrilling 
moment  a  reward  sufficient  to  compensate  him  for 
all  his  pains  in  arriving  at  it ;  and  most  branches  of 
science  would  yield  us  similar  illustrations.  Indeed, 
the  career  characteristic  of  scientists  and  philoso- 
phers generally  is  a  conclusive  proof  that  the  prin- 
cipal motive  of  their  activity  is  not  the  desire  of  any 
extrinsic  reward,  the  amount  of  which  they  will  bal- 
ance against  the  amount  or  the  quality  of  their 
efforts,  but  a  passion  for  truth  as  truth,  which  they 
indulge  in  for  its  own  sake  only. 

Now  granting  all  this,  what  will  its  bearing  be  on 
the  question  of  whether  the  pleasures  of  pure  self- 
realisation  will  suffice  to  stimulate  those  exceptional 


296 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  IV 
Chapter  2 

and  works  of 
art  are  wealth ; 
and  scientific 
discovery  is  the 
basis  of 
industrial 
progress ; 


but  great 
works  of  art 
form  but  a 
small  part  of 
wealth ; 


faculties  whose  function  it  is  to  maintain  and 
increase  the  production  of  wealth  ?  With  regard 
to  artistic  creation,  we  are  certainly  bound  to 
admit  that  great  works  of  art  are  wealth  of  a  highly 
important  kind,  and  when  a  good  picture  is  pro- 
duced, as  it  often  is,  solely  in  obedience  to  the 
painter's  artistic  impulse,  we  have  a  genuine  exam- 
ple of  wealth  produced  in  obedience  to  that  kind  of 
motive  whose  efficiency  the  socialists  desire  to 
establish.  Further,  with  regard  to  the  pursuit  of 
truth,  as  Mill  points  out  in  a  passage  that  has  been 
already  quoted,  progress  in  speculative  knowledge 
is  the  basis  of  all  other  progress,  and  notably  of 
progress  in  the  arts  and  processes  of  wealth-pro- 
duction. It  must,  accordingly,  be  admitted  that  in  a 
certain  sense  all  progress  in  wealth-production  has 
for  its  basis  a  kind  of  disinterested  activity  with 
which  the  desire  of  possessing  wealth  has  nothing 
at  all  to  do.  And  yet  in  spite  of  this,  neither  the 
case  of  the  artist  nor  of  the  philosopher  warrants 
the  inference  that  the  motives  which  are  sufficient 
for  them  will  ever  have  a  similar  effect  on  the  fac- 
ulties of  the  great  wealth-producers.  The  evi- 
dence, in  fact,  as  soon  as  we  have  fully  examined 
it,  will  be  found  to  point  in  a  direction  precisely 
opposite. 

For,  to  begin  with  the  case  of  the  artist,  it  must 
be  remembered,  in  the  first  place,  that  works  of  art, 
such  as  pictures  painted  by  the  artist's  hand,  form 
a  very  small,  though  an  important  part  of  wealth, 
and   that   they  are  hardly  wealth  at  all  from  the 


MOTIVES   OF  THE  ARTIST  297 

point  of  view  of  the  many,  unless  they  are  repro-    ^°°^  '^' 
duced    and     multipHed    by    adequate    mechanical 
processes.     Now,    though    it   is   quite   conceivable 
that    a    painter    might    paint    a    Madonna    solely 
because  the  realisation  of  his  own  ideas  delighted 
him,  it  is  hardly  to  be  expected  that  other  men  will 
rack  their  brains  to  devise  blocks,  presses,  and  prep- 
arations by  which  copies  of  it  may  be  made  and 
multiplied,  solely  for  the  pleasure  of  reproducing 
ideas  which  are  not  their  own.     It  must  further  be 
added  that  delight  in  creation  for  its  own  sake  can 
be  attributed  as  a  sufficient  motive  to  the  highest 
class  of  artists  only.     As  for  the  men  whose  artistic  and  artistic 
powers  are  true,  but  qualify  them  only  for  decorative,  than  the 
not  for  creative  work,  —  the  men,  for  example,  who  motived  by  the 
design  beautiful  stuffs  and  furniture,  —  though  the  f!!"^^°l 

o  '  o  pecuniary 

exercise  of  their  power  may  be  doubtless  itself  a'^^^^'^'i: 
pleasure  to  them,  they  are  certainly  as  a  class  not 
given  to  exercising  them  without  the  expectation  of 
some  proportionate  pecuniary  reward.  Indeed,  in 
exact  proportion  as  artistic  creation  assimilates  itself 
to  the  processes  by  which  wealth  in  general  is  pro- 
duced, the  mere  pleasure  of  the  work  itself  ceases 
to  be  a  sufficient  motive  for  it. 

Next,  with  regard  to  the  pursuit  of  speculative  wwist  scientific 
knowledge,  though  this,  and  more  especially  pure  though  made 
scientific  discovery,  may  form  the  basis  of  all  pro-  fh" detire^for"' 
ductive  effort,  it  is  very  far  from  being  a  form  of  *'■"'^  ^J^ 

^  ^  •'  '-'  apphed  to 

productive  effort  itself.     It  has,  on  the  contrary,  no  weaith-produc- 

...  ^        ,  tion  because 

necessary  connection   with   it.      It  does   not   even  the  men  who 
belong  to  the  region  in  which  such  effort  operates.  dSrVteaith. 


298  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  IV     Scientific  truths,  as  apprehended  by  the  mere  seeker 

Chapter  2  '^^  -^  .... 

after  speculative  knowledge,  are  like  powerful  spirits 
secluded  in  some  distant  star ;  and,  for  any  effect 
which  they  have  on  the  processes  of  economic  pro- 
duction, they  might  just  as  well  have  never  been 
discovered  at  all.  Before  they  can  be  applied  to 
practical  purposes  they  have  to  be  mastered  and 
digested  by  a  new  class  of  men  altogether,  who 
value  them  not  for  themselves,  but  solely  for  the 
use  they  can  be  put  to.  Thus,  in  order  that 
speculative  truths  may  be  connected  with  produc- 
tive effort,  they  must  pass  out  of  the  hands  of  the 
men  who  first  discovered  them,  and  be  made  over 
to  men  whose  motive  in  acquiring  them  will  em- 
phatically not  be  desire  of  the  mere  pleasure  of 
intellectual  acquisition,  but  the  desire  of  some 
marketable  products  with  a  calculable  pecuniary 
value,  in  the  production  of  which  a  knowledge  of 
the  truths  in  question  will  help  them.  Thus  specu- 
lative activity,  just  like  artistic  creation,  in  exact 
proportion  as  it  connects  itself  with  the  ordinary 
processes  of  wealth-production,  ceases  to  find  its 
motive  in  the  desire  of  self-realisation,  and  claims 
to  be  rewarded  by  the  possession  of  the  objective 
results  produced  by  it. 
What,  how-  And  now  let  us  turn  from  the  motives  which  con- 
facTth°atthe  sist  in  the  desire  of  self-realisation  to  those  which 
honour°makes  consist  in  the  dcsirc  of  the  approbation  or  the 
the  soldier       homaQjc  of  othcrs.     This  desire,  which  exercises  a 

work  harder  .  1  •  i 

than  any         great  mflucnce  on  the  artist,  and  often  also  on  the 
^  ^"'^^'^         seeker  after  speculative  truth,  concurrently  with  the 


THE  SOLDIER'S  MOTIVE  IN  BATTLE       299 

desire  of  pure  self-realisation,  exhibits  its  force  most     ^^o''  '^ 
signally  when  it  is  the  motive  of  military  heroism ; 
and  the  readiness  with  which  a  soldier  will  risk  his 
life  for  honour  —  honour  which  brings  with  it  noth- 
ing besides  itself,  excepting  perhaps  a  medal  and  a  why,  the 
scrap  of  ribbon  —  has  been  said  by  socialistic  writers  should  not  the 
to  afford  a  conclusive  proof  that  any  practical  work,  ^^g  the  great 
no  matter  how  laborious,  and  more  particularly  the  ^^^"^"P''°' 

^^  J  Queer  work  ? 

work  of  the  great  wealth-producer,  will  be  willingly 
undertaken  for  the  sake  of  the  same  reward. 
"  The  soldier s  subsistence  is  certain^''  writes  a 
well-known  contemporary  enthusiast.  "  It  does  not 
depend  upon  his  exertioiis.  At  once  he  becomes 
susceptible  to  appeals  to  his  patriotism.  He  will 
dare  anything  for  glory,  and  value  a  bit  of  bronze 
which  is  '  the  reward  of  valour '  far  more  than  a 
hu7tdred  times  its  weight  in  gold!''  The  implication, 
of  course,  is  that  what  men  will  do  in  war  they  will 
do  in  peaceful  industry ;  and  the  writer  adds,  in 
order  to  point  this  moral,  ^'^ yet  many  of  the  private 
soldiers  come  from  the  worst  of  the  population^ 
This  passage  is  quoted  with  rapture  by  another 
socialistic  theorist,  who  exclaims,  "  Let  those  es- 
pecially notice  this  last  point  who  fancy  we  must 
wait  till  men  are  angels  before  socialism,  be  practical!' 
And  even  so  well-trained  a  thinker  as  Mr.  Frederic  Mr.  Frederic 
Harrison  has  argued,  from  the  readiness  with  which  urged  a  similar 
men  die  in  battle  for  their  country,  that  they  will  be  ^'"g"'"^"'- 
equally  willing  to  deny  themselves  or  suffer  martyr- 
dom for  universal  humanity. 

To  all  these  ideas  and  arguments    there  is  one 


300  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  IV     answer  to  be  made.     They  are  all  founded  on  a 

Chapter  2  ,  ,  ...  .    . 

failure  to  perceive  the  fact  that  military  activity  is 
The  answer  to  in  many  respects  a  thin^   apart,  and    depends   on 

this  is  that  the  1      1        •       i  ^    •      ^         i  1         •    1        •       1 

work  of  the  psychological,  and  indeed  on  physiological  processes 
exceptional;  which  havc  uo  Counterpart  in  the  domain  of  ordinary 
effort.  That  such  is  the  case  can  be  seen  very  easily 
by  following  out  the  train  of  argument  suggested  by 
Mr.  Harrison.  Mr.  Harrison  sees  that  in  ordinary 
life  a  man  will  not  deliberately  run  the  risk  of  being 
killed  except  for  the  sake  of  a  cause  or  person  to  which 
or  whom  he  is  profoundly  and  indescribably  attached. 
Indeed  his  attachment  is  presumably  in  proportion 
to  the  risk  he  is  prepared  to  run.  And  such  being 
the  case  in  the  field  of  ordinary  life,  Mr.  Harrison 
assumes  it  must  be  the  case  on  the  field  of  battle 
also,  and  that  the  soldier's  willingness  to  risk  death 
in  fighting  for  a  cause  or  country  proves  that  this 
cause  or  country  is  inexpressibly  dear  to  him. 
And  in  certain  cases  —  when  a  country  is  in  desperate 
straits,  and  everything  hangs  on  the  issue  of  a  single 
battle  —  this  inference  would  be  doubtless  just;  but 
that  it  is  not  so  generally  is  shown  by  the  notorious 
fact  that  some  of  the  bravest  and  most  reckless 
soldiers  ever  known  to  history  have  been  mercenaries 
who  would  fight  as  willingly  for  one  country  as  for 
another.  Thus  until  Mr.  Harrison  can  show  us  that 
men  in  ordinary  life  will  wear  themselves  out  for 
either  of  two  opposed  objects  indifferently,  or  that 
they  will  risk  death  as  willingly  for  a  plain  woman 
as  for  a  pretty  one,  it  is  obvious  that  men's  willing- 
ness to  risk  death  in  war  implies  no  corresponding 


THE  SOLDIER'S   CASE  EXCEPTIONAL       301 
willino^ness  to   risk    it   cuttine:  trousers,  and  is  for     Bookiv 

•  1  T  ,        •         ir  Chapters 

certain  reasons  a  phenomenon  standing  by  itself. 

That  this  is  so  is  shown    even    more  strikingly 
by  the  fact  to  which   the  two   other   writers   just  ^"'^^■^"""o* 

...  ,  .  argue  from  it 

quoted  point  with  so  much  complacency.  This  fact  to  the  work  of 
is  the  soldier's  undoubted  willingness  to  pursue  "^^  '"^"^^ 
his  calling  for  pay  which  seems  strikingly  incom- 
mensurate with  his  risks.  His  conduct  in  this 
respect  is,  no  doubt,  remarkable,  especially  when 
compared  with  that  of  men  in  the  domain  of  peace- 
ful industry.  When  any  industrial  occupation  is 
in  question  a  workman  will  expect  special  wages 
if  it  is  one  which  presents  a  likelihood  of  his  often 
hurting  his  thumb ;  but  soldiers  will  risk  the  prob- 
ability of  being  tortured  and  blown  to  pieces  for 
wages  which  would  hardly  induce  a  peasant  to  hoe  a 
turnip-field.  This  is  no  indication  of  any  abnormal 
poverty  amongst  the  classes  from  whom  the  army  is 
mainly  recruited,  for  the  same  phenomenon  is  con- 
stantly observable  amongst  men  who  are  not  under 
the  necessity  of  working  for  their  living  at  all. 
Amongst  such  men  are  numbers  who  in  time  of 
actual  war  will  eagerly  give  up  a  life  of  leisure  and 
luxury  for  the  certainty  of  hardships  and  the  prob- 
ability of  death  —  men  who  for  the  sake  of  anything 
else  but  fighting  would  hardly,  without  a  struggle, 
run  the  risk  of  a  bad  dinner.  But  what  these  facts 
really  suggest  to  us  is  not  the  insane  conclusion 
that  because  soldiers  act  differently  from  other  men, 
other  men  may  be  counted  on  to  act  like  soldiers. 
On  the  contrary,  what  they  suggest  is  the  question 


302  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  IV     ^i^y  rnen  will  do  as  soldiers  what  no  one  will  do  in 

Chapters  •'  , 

any  other  capacity,  and  what   soldiers    themselves 
will  cease  to  do  as  soon  as  they  become  commis- 
sionaires. 
The  fighting         Yox  this  peculiarity  in  the  soldier's  conduct  there 

instinct  is  ^  /-->v  •        i  • 

inherent  in  the  are  three  Separate  reasons.  One  is  the  strictness  of 
x^^^^^  military  discipline,  which  socialistic  reformers  would 
hardly  find  popular  if  they  tried  to  introduce  it  into 
factories  and  contractors'  yards.  A  second  is  the 
peculiar  character  of  the  circumstances  in  which  the 
soldier  is  placed  when  his  courage  is  most  severely 
taxed  —  circumstances  which  render  the  attempt  to 
evade  peril  almost  as  difficult,  and  often  more 
perilous,  than  facing  it,  and  which  in  ordinary  life 
would  be  intolerable  if  they  did  not  happen  to  be 
impossible.     But  the  most  important  reason  is  this 

—  and  the  others  without  it  would  be  non-existent 

—  that  the  instinct  of  fighting  is  inherent  in  the  very 
nature  of  the  dominant  races,  and  it  will  always 
prompt  numbers  to  do  for  the  smallest  reward  what 
they  could  hardly,  in  its  absence,  be  induced  to  do 
for  the  largest.  This  immemorial  instinct  has  been 
wrought  into  our  blood  and  nerves  by  the  innumer- 
able thousands  of  years  that  have  made  us  what  we 
are ;  and  all  the  battles  of  their  fathers  are  pulsing  in 
men's  veins  to-day.  These  instincts,  no  doubt,  are 
more  controlled  than  formerly,  and  not  so  frequently 
roused;  but  they  are  still  there.  They  are  ready 
to  quicken  at  the  mere  sound  of  military  music ; 
and  the  sight  of  a  regiment  marching  draws  cheers 
from   the   most   democratic   crowd.      Here  is   the 


MOTIVES   OF  THE    GREAT  CONQUEROR      303 
reason  why  the  soldier,  thou2:h  he  submits  himself    J?°°''  ^^ 

-^       .  .  .  .  Chapter  a 

to  the  most  direct  coercion,  never  considers  himself, 
and  never  is  considered,  a  slave ;  and  military 
activity   will    always    be    a    thino:    apart,    and    fori"  a  way  in 

^  ^  ^11  which  the 

purposes  or  argument  will  never  be  comparable  to  industrial 
industrial,  till  human  nature  undergoes  so  radical '"^ '"*^ '^  ""^ ' 
a  change  that  men  will  as  eagerly  risk  being  killed 
by  unfenced  machinery  in  a  cotton-mill  as  they  will 
being  killed  by  a  bullet  or  a  bayonet  on  the  field 
of  battle.  Here  again  the  facts  for  which  the 
socialists  reason  are  indubitable ;  but  the  inference 
which  the  socialists  draw  from  them  is  altogether 
illusory. 

It  remains,  however,  to  add   that  the  desire  of  And  even  in 

.  war  those  who 

mere  honour  —  of  honour  unaccompanied  by  any  make  the  pro- 
extrinsic    advantages  —  has  an   efficiency  which  is  lectuai  efforts 
strictly   limited    in    the   domain    even   of    military  [o^otlfet'Te-'' 
activity  itself.     It   may  move   men,  in   the   act  of  ^^^''^^  besides 

-,.  ii'i  1  1  •  •  mere  honour. 

fighting,  to  the  highest  and  most  heroic  actions ; 
but  history  shows  us  that  it  has  not  been  found 
sufficient  to  elicit  the  sustained  intellectual  efforts 
of  the  General,  bent  on  achieving  some  great  and 
monumental  conquest  —  efforts  in  which  all  the 
excitement  of  the  actual  fighter  is  wanting,  and  in 
which  the  coolest  calculation  plays  as  large  a  part  as 
courage.  The  Caesars  and  Napoleons  of  the  world 
have  certainly  not,  as  a  rule,  been  content,  when 
they  have  crushed  their  enemies  and  augmented 
the  magnificence  of  their  country,  with  the  gift  of  a 
medal  or  two,  and  the  privilege  of  ending  their  days 
in  the  modest  uniform  of  commissionaires  opening 


304  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  IV     shop  doors.      If,  then,  the  mere   honour  of   being 

Chapters  ^  .       .  ^-.    .  ,  ° 

a  great  conqueror  is  insufncient   to  stimulate  the 

Still  more  will  activitics  by  which  great  conquests  are  achieved,  a 

wealth-pro-      man  is  hardly  likely  to  consecrate  his  entire  faculties 

o  so.    ^^  wealth-production  merely  that  he  may  enjoy  the 

honour  of  being  known  as  the  proud  producer  of  so 

many  miles  of  calico,  or  millions  of  pots  of  jam. 

There  is  there-      Thcrc  is,  therefore,  in  the  present  operations  of 

fore  nothing  .  .  i   •    i         i  •    i  • 

to  show  that     those  motives,  for  which  the  socialists  attempt  to 

motives  win     claim  a  universal  efficiency,  as  little  to  suggest  that  as 

desi>e  o1^  *^^   motives  to  exceptional  wealth-production  they  will 

wealth.  ever  supersede  the  desire  of  exceptional  possession, 

as  there  is  in  the  present  operations  of  the  desire  of 

exceptional   wealth-possession    to   show    that   it   is 

losing  its  power,  or  is  at  all  likely  to  be  superseded. 

The  final  demonstration  of  this  truth,  however,  yet 

remains  to  be  given. 

What  they  Thc  socialists,  in  dealinsr  with  this  question  of 

really  do,  and  .  i      i     •  i  •  i 

what  socialists  motive,  havc  been  led  into  the   curious    blunders 

fail  to  see,  istoi-ii  ..  ■,  ii,i«< 

mix  with  the  which  havc  just  now  been  exposed  by  their  singu- 
vteauh^and  ^^^^Y  childish  conccption  of  what  men's  actual 
add  to  its        motives  are.     They  divide  motives  into  various  well- 

cmciency;  •'  ,  ^ 

known  classes,  and,  so  far  as  it  goes,  their  procedure 
is  here  correct.  Their  error  is  that  they  conceive  of 
man  as  a  being  on  whom  these  motives,  as  a  rule, 
act  separately  ;  whereas  in  reality  the  very  reverse  is 
the  case.  Acts  which  are  due  to  any  single  motive 
are  not  the  rule,  but  the  exception.  For  instance, 
even  though  artistic  creation  and  the  pursuit  of  truth 
are  motived  in  the  case  of  many  men  by  the  pleasure 
which  the  work  brings  them,  some  of  the  greatest 


WEALTH  FOR   ITS   OWN  SAKE  305 

artists   and   thinkers,  with  whom   this  motive  was     Bookiv 

Chapter  2 

certainly  powerful,  have  been  motived  by  the  desire 

of  pecuniarv  reward  also.     It  is  enousfh  to  mention  as  the  desire  of 

y      c^^      ^  -n,     ^  wealth  has 

the  names  of  Bacon  and  Shakespeare,  Rubens,  mixed  with 
Turner,  and  Scott.  And  with  the  desire  of  honour  °nmen"ke" 
the  desire  of  pecuniary  reward  is  found  to  mix  itself  ^Xn's  etc, 
yet  more  often  and  readily  than  it  does  with  the 
mere  passion  for  artistic  or  for  speculative  work 
itself.  The  psychological  fact,  however,  which  we 
must  here  notice  is  this  —  that  the  pecuniary  reward, 
though  it  seems  theoretically  to  be  in  contrast  to  any 
genuine  desire  for  other  men's  approbation,  or  for 
the  pleasure  brought  to  the  worker  by  the  work 
itself,  instead  of  destroying  the  force  of  those  other 
motives,  increases  it,  just  as  the  admixture  of  a  cer- 
tain amount  of  alloy  makes  gold  and  silver  more 
valuable  for  artistic  purposes.  And  now,  having 
observed  this,  let  us  turn  back  to  the  consideration 
of  the  desire  of  pecuniary  reward  as  the  principal 
motive  of  wealth-production,  and  endeavour  to  make 
our  analysis  of  it  more  complete. 

As  the  reader  will  recollect,  the  doctrine  that  all  For  in  saying 

.  that  the  desire 

exceptional     exertions     m    wealth-production     are  of  wealth  is 
motived  solely  by  the  desire  of  exceptional  wealth  motilrMo''^  * 
as  such,  although  it  is  the  doctrine  imputed  by  the  ducUonTe"do 
socialists  to  their  opponents,  has  been  said  already  "o'^^^n  the 

^  ^  ,  ,  •'    desire  of  wealth 

to  be  a  very  imperfect  rendering  of  any  doctnne  as  for  its  own 
to  the  subject  which  their  opponents  would  actually 
maintain;  and  the  reason  why  it  is  imperfect  is  simply 
that  wealth  as  such  is  not  the  object  for  which  wealth 
is  really  sought  by  most  of  those  men  whom  the 


3o6  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  IV     desire  of  it  most  powerfully  influences.     For  wealth 

Chapter  2  .  '^ .  r     1  1 

as  such,  in  the  ordinary  sense  of  the  phrase,  is  wealth 
or  for  the  sake  rcofardcd  as  a  means  of  personal  self-induleence.     It 

of  physical  "  ^  .  .  '-' 

gratification,  stands  for  the  finest  wines,  the  richest  food,  the 
softest  beds,  the  most  luxurious  furniture — for  every- 
thing that  can  caress  the  senses  and  enervate  the 
mind  and  body.  And  no  doubt  its  power  of  securing 
all  these  things  to  its  possessors  is  one  of  the  qualities 
which  render  it  an  object  of  desire.  But  it  is  only 
one ;  and  though  it  is  the  most  obvious  of  them, 
it  is  not  the  chief.  The  subordinate  place  which  it 
occupies  is  conclusively  shown  by  the  fact  that  a 
very  few  thousands  a  year  would  suffice  to  provide 

This  forms  a    a  man  with  every  pleasure  or  luxury  that  his  own 

small  part  of  1  1  • 

its  desirability,  scuscs  could  appreciate ;  and  yet  men  are  often  more 
eager,  after  these  few  thousands  have  been  secured 
by  them,  to  pass  this  point  of  opulence  than  they 
ever  were  in  reaching  it.  Many  men,  moreover, 
who  have  surrounded  themselves  with  pomp  and 
splendour  are  indifferent  to  the  gratification  of  their 
own  senses  altogether.  Though  their  luncheon 
tables  may  groan  under  every  imaginable  delicacy, 
they  will  themselves  eat  a  slice  or  two  of  cold  ham, 
no  better  or  worse  than  would  have  been  secured 
them  for  a  shilling  in  a  cheap  restaurant.  Their 
own  beds  will  be  no  softer  than  those  of  prosperous 
clerks;  and,  surrounded  by  cushioned  sofas,  they 
will  sit  upon  straight-backed  chairs. 

The  principal  reasons  for  which  wealth  is  sought 
are  not  pleasures  of  the  senses,  but  pleasures  of  the 
mind  and  the  imagination ;  and  of  these  pleasures 


social- 
sr  in- 
stead of  it. 


WEALTH  DESIRED  AS  A  MEANS  307 

there  are  three  principal  kinds.     One  of  them  is  the     ^0°''  ^^ 

.  .  .  ...  Chapter  2 

pleasure  of  power,  which  in  their  analysis  of  human 
motives   the  socialists   conveniently  overlook;  and  ^* '! •?"'''«*^ 

•'  mainly  as  a 

the  two  others   happen    to    be  the  very  pleasures  means  to 
by  the  desire  of  which  the  socialists  themselves  de-  those  very 
clare    the  exceptional  wealth-producers   are   to   be  J'hkh  To< 
principally  marked  in  the  future — namely,  the  pleas-  'sts  offer  in 
ures  of  self-realisation  and  the  pleasures  of  social 
honour.      Wealth    is   coveted   by   all    really   great 
wealth-producers,   not   in  preference   to  these,   but 
as  a  means  to  all  or  one  of  them.     To  many  of  our 
great  wealth-producers,  with  their  strong  practical 
faculties,  wealth  would  be  nothing  if  it  brought  to 
them  no  accession  of  influence ;  to  many  it  would 
be  nothing  if  it  did  not  bring  them  the  means  of 
indulging  their  tastes,  as  distinct  from  their  physical 
appetites ;  to  nearly  all  it  would  be  nothing  if  they 
did  not,  or  if  they  did  not  hope  it  would,  secure  for 
them  the  approbation  and  the  respectful  homage  of 
others. 

The  only  alternatives,  then,  which  we  have  before 
us  are  as  follows  :  —  If  the  great  wealth-producer  is  a 
man  of  such  coarse  fibre  that  none  of  those  desires 
just  mentioned  are  really  his  —  neither  the  desire  of 
power,  nor  the  desire  of  social  honour,  nor  the  de- 
sire for  that  larger  development  of  taste  and  moral 
activities  which  is  rendered  possible  by  the  posses- 
sion of  exceptional  wealth  —  then  it  is  obvious  that 
the  sole  motive  left  to  him  will  be  the  gross  or 
unreasoning  desire  for  the  possession  of  wealth 
as  such ;  and  we  are  brought  back  to  the  original 


3o8 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  IV 
Chapter  2 

The  great 
wealth-pro- 
ducers suscep- 
tible to  the 
motives  on 
which  the 
socialists 
dwell  will 
desire  excep- 
tional wealth 
all  the  more 
because  of 
them. 


proposition  which  the  sociaHsts  set  themselves  to 
annihilate.  But  if,  on  the  other  hand,  the  great 
wealth-producer  is  really  capable  of  those  higher 
desires  which  the  socialists  assure  us  will  shortly 
become  so  strong  in  him,  the  desire  of  exceptional 
wealth,  instead  of  being  superseded  by  these,  will 
be  stronger  beyond  calculation  than  it  ever  could 
be  without  them. 

And  it  is,  as  a  rule,  the  latter  of  these  two 
suppositions  which  practically  represents  the  truth. 
Exceptional  wealth  is  desired  by  the  men  who 
produce  it  not  for  itself,  but  for  its  results ;  and  in 
proportion  as  the  man  who  desires  it  possesses  a 
lofty  character,  his  desire  for  it,  being  merged  in  the 
thought  of  the  uses  to  which  he  desires  to  put  it, 
will  itself  become  equally  lofty  also.  But  none  the 
less  will  the  desire  of  the  material  wealth  form  the 
physical  basis  in  which  his  loftier  desires  inhere,  just 
as  the  impulse  of  sex  remains  the  physical  basis  of 
the  deepest  and  tenderest  love  which  a  man  feels  for 
a  woman,  or  as  the  brain  is  the  physical  basis  of  every 
thought  that  a  man  can  think.  Thus  the  arguments 
of  the  socialists  recoil  upon  their  own  heads ;  and 
instead  of  tending  to  show  that  the  desire  of  pos- 
sessing exceptional  wealth  will  ever  cease  to  be  in- 
dispensable as  a  motive  to  exceptional  production  of 
it,  they  have  merely  succeeded  in  calling  attention 
to  the  facts  on  which  the  indispensable  character  of 
this  motive  depends. 

We  have  not,  however,  finished  with  this  ques- 
tion yet.     There  is  a  further  set  of  objections  still 


EARNED  AND   TRANSMITTED    WEALTH     309 
remaininsf  to  be  considered  which,  whilst  based  on     ^^^'^  ^^ 

...  ...  Chapter  a 

an  admission  that  wealth-production  is  motived  by  the 
desire  of  wealth,  aims  at  showing  that  this  fact  does 
not  necessarily  result  in  more  than  a  fraction  of  the 
consequences  which  have  up  to  this  time  flowed  from 
it,  but  merely  shows  in  reality  that  those  consequences 
are  unalterable,  and  adds  new  force  to  the  arguments 
that  have  just  been  urged  with  regard  to  them. 

The  objections  referred  to  are  those  embodied  in  n  is  argued. 

however  bv 

the  well-known  contention  that  though  the  posses-  semi-sodaiists 
sion  of  exceptional  wealth  must  be  allowed  to  the  proVucermay 
exceptional  men  who  are  actually  eng^ao^ed  in  pro-  ^"^  snowed  the 

^  J  <j    o  1  income  he  pro- 

ducing it,  and  the  exercise  of  whose  business  ability  duces,  but  that 

...  ,  .  this  must  end 

IS  just  as  essential  to  the  country  s  prosperity  as  to  with  his  life, 
their  own,  yet  this  possession  of  wealth  should  be  pLsed  on^o 
limited  to  themselves  personally,  and  should  not  be !"'!  ^^"1''-^  ^^ 

■i^  J  '  mterest  on 

allowed  to  distribute  itself  amongst  their  idle  and  bequeathed 
inefficient  families.  In  other  words,  it  is  urged  that 
whilst  the  founders  and  conductors  of  businesses  are 
entitled  to  the  incomes,  no  matter  how  large,  that 
are  due  to  the  exercise  of  their  own  powers,  these 
incomes  should  cease  with  the  cessation  of  the 
powers  that  caused  them,  and  should  not  be  allowed 
to  perpetuate  themselves,  as  they  do  now,  in  the 
shape  of  interest  paid  to  the  passive  owners  of 
capital.  Such  an  arrangement,  it  is  maintained  by 
those  who  advocate  it,  would  at  once  coincide  with  the 
dictates  of  abstract  justice,  and  whilst  securing  to  the 
exceptional  wealth-producer,  whose  services  society 
requires,  the  full  reward  and  motive  necessary  to 
ensure  his  activity,  would  enrich  the  community  at 


3IO  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  IV     large  by  distributing  amongst  it  an  enormous  income, 

Chapter  2  ,  ?  ,     -^  .  ^  .    ^,       .         .      .  ,       , 

which  at  present,  mstead  of  stimulatmg  anybody  to 
any  useful  exertion,  merely  keeps  a  number  of  men 
in  idleness.  And  this  contention  at  first  sight  does 
It  is  claimed  not  lack  plausIbility  either  in  respect  of  the  question 
arrangement  of  abstract  justicc  vvhich  it  raiscs,  or  of  the  practical 
with  abs'tJacf^  consequences  which,  according  to  it,  the  arrange- 
justice;  ment  in  question  would  produce.     When    we   ex- 

amine it  closely,  however,  the  plausibility  vanishes, 
and  abstract  justice  and  practical  reason  alike  con- 
demn the  appeals  thus  made  to  them  as  founded 
entirely  on  misconception. 

Let  us  deal  with  the  question  of  abstract  justice 

first.     Those  who   denounce    interest  or  unearned 

income  as  unjust,  invariably  state  their  case  in  the 

following  simple  form.     There  are  only  two  ways, 

for  it  is  argued  ^hcv  sav,  in  which  a  man  can  become  possessed  of 

that  all  wealth  .  .  . 

which  is  not  wcaltli  —  either  by  producmg  such  and  such  an 
must  be  stolen,  amount  himsclf,  or  by  appropriating  such  and  such 
an  amount  that  has  been  produced  by  another 
person ;  or,  as  they  frequently  put  it,  with  an  air  of 
solemn  sententiousness,  ''A  mmi  can  get  an  income 
only  by  working  or  by  stealing:  there  is  no  third 
way/''  Now  one  conclusive  answer  to  this  puerile, 
though  popular,  sophism  has,  strangely  enough, 
been  given  by  Mr.  Henry  George,  who,  though 
eager  to  adopt  any  argument  that  could  be  used  to 
assail  the  rich,  was,  nevertheless,  not  taken  in  by 
this.  Mr.  George  pointed  out  that  one  kind  of 
wealth,  at  all  events,  —  and  we  may  add  that  in  this 
we  have  wealth   in   its   oldest  form, — consists  of 


CAPITAL  AS  A    WEALTH-PRODUCER         311 
possessions  which  have  been  neither  made  by  the     "^"^^^  ^^ 

,  Chapter  2 

possessors  nor  yet  stolen  by  them.  That  is  to  say, 
it  consists  of  flocks  and  herds.  Mr.  George  pointed 
out  also  that  whole  classes  of  possessions  besides 
are,  for  by  far  the  larger  part  of  their  value,  equally 
independent  of  either  work  or  theft.     Such  posses- This  is  utterly 

1  T  j^        •  • ,  1       ,  •  untrue,  as  the 

sions  are  wmes,  whose  quality  improves  with  time,  case  of  flocks 
and  whose  value,  consequently,  whether  in  exchange  show^g^u? 
or  use,  is  increased  from  year  to  year  by  the  secret 
operations  of  nature.  But  Mr.  George,  though  his 
arguments  were  true  so  far  as  they  went,  did  little 
more  than  touch  the  hem  of  the  question ;  for 
flocks  and  herds,  and  commodities  that  grow  valu- 
able as  they  mature  themselves,  form  but  a  small, 
though  they  do  form  a  typical,  portion  of  wealth  that 
may  come  to  a  man  without  his  having  produced  it 
himself,  and  without  his  stealing  it  from  any  other 
human  producer.  And  this  is  the  wealth  which  is 
actually  produced  by  capital. 

In  order  to  show  the  reader   that  capital  is   an  but  the  chief 

.        ^  1  •  ,  ,    ,  .  producer  of 

actual  producer,  in  as  true  a  sense  as  labour  is,  or  wealth  that  is 
the  ability  by  which  labour  is  directed,  let  us  begin  "s°capit2,^^  ^°' 
by  considerinor  fixed  capital  as  distinct  from  wasre  ^'^''r^ '^  p^^^ 

J  O  IT  o     productive 

capital,  and  by  considering  it  in  its  simplest  forms,  ability  stored 
By  fixed  capital  is  meant  any  tools,  machines,  or  externalised. 
materials  by  which  man's  efficiency  as  a  producer 
of  wealth  is  increased ;  and  we  will  take  as  examples 
of  these  the  three  following  things — a  dart  or  missile 
by  which  game  may  be  killed ;  a  heap  of  manure 
by  which  a  peasant's  field  may  be  fertilised ;  and  a 
horse   which   a   peasant   uses   for   ploughing   and 


312 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  IV 
Chapter  a 


The  dart  of  a 
savage  hunter, 


the  manure 
heap  or  cart 
horse  of  a 
peasant, 


kindred  purposes.  Now  let  us  imagine  a  race  of 
savages  who  use  no  missiles  at  all,  but  catch  their 
game  merely  by  sleight  of  hand.  If  a  man  is 
entitled  to  such  game  as  he  catches,  the  excep- 
tionally dexterous  hunter  who  catches  most  will  be 
necessarily  the  rightful  possessor  of  more  game 
than  his  fellows.  This  will  be  granted  by  those 
who  admit  that  work  constitutes  a  true,  and  the 
only  true  title  to  possession. 

Such  being  the  case,  then,  let  us  alter  our  sup- 
position somewhat,  and  suppose  that  the  hunters, 
instead  of  catching  the  game  with  their  hands,  kill 
it  with  wooden  darts ;  and  that  the  amount  of  game 
which  each  hunter  will  secure  in  a  day  depends  not 
on  the  skill  with  which  the  darts  are  thrown,  but 
on  the  skill  with  which  the  darts  are  made.  Under 
these  circumstances,  the  hunter  who  secures  most 
will  not  be  the  man  who  is  quickest  in  seizing  the 
quarry  with  his  hands,  but  the  man  who  makes  the 
darts  that  will  reach  their  mark  most  certainly ;  and 
yet  no  one  would  say  that  he  was  less  entitled  to 
what  he  took,  because  his  exceptional  skill,  before 
it  could  become  effectual,  was  obliged  to  become 
embodied  in  some  object  external  to  himself. 

In  the  same  way,  if  two  peasants  are  cultivating 
similar  fields,  and  one,  by  sheer  hard  work,  raises 
a  larger  crop  than  the  other,  his  right  to  his  larger 
crop  would  not  be  denied  by  anybody.  Let  us 
suppose,  then,  that  instead  of  working  harder  than 
his  neighbour  he  works  more  intelligently,  that  he 
saves  and  stores  up  as  manure  materials  which  his 


MACHINES  AS  ARTIFICIAL  SLAVES         313 
nei2:hbour   wastes;    and   that   every  year,  through     Bookiv 

1  ,  1    •       ,  •  ,1  Chapter  2 

the  powers  accumulated  in  his  manure  heap,  he  can 
raise  a  larger  crop  than  his  neighbour,  though  he  are  forms  of 
actually  works  less.     Would  any  one  affirm  that  the  are  actual 
man  lost  his  right  to  his  extra  produce  because  he  She  product^ 
produced    it   indirectly  by  the   external    agency  of  belongs  to 

i  J        J  o  J  those  who  own 

his  manure,  and  not  directly  by  overstraining  his  them, 
muscles }  Or  again,  if  one  of  the  peasants  raised 
a  larger  crop  than  his  neighbour  because,  whilst  his 
neighbour  spent  all  his  money  in  drinking,  he  him- 
self saved  it  and  bought  a  horse,  would  any  one  main- 
tain that  the  extra  crop  due  to  the  work  which  the 
horse  performed  for  its  owner  did  not  belong  to  the 
owner,  but  was  stolen  by  him  from  the  other  man } 

No  one  would  put  forward  an  argument  so  absurd  The  same  is 

'■  *-'  the  case  with 

as  this.  And  yet  the  wooden  darts  of  the  savage  such  capital  as 
and  the  manure  heap  and  the  horse  of  the  peasant  are  mfnufactory 
neither  more  nor  less  than  portions  of  fixed  capital,  ^^^^^' 
just  as  a  steam  engine  is,  or  a  cotton  mill  with*  all  its 
plant.  Fixed  capital  is  merely  productive  ability 
which,  instead  of  acting  directly  in  the  production  of 
goods  for  the  consumer,  stores  itself  up  in  externalised 
means  of  production,  so  that  it  may,  with  accumu- 
lated force,  produce  such  goods  indirectly ;  and  the 
additional  wealth  which  a  man  produces  by  a  new 
machine  is  just  as  much  produced  by  himself  as  is 
the  additional  crop  which  he  raises  from  a  patch  of 
land  by  the  employment  of  a  horse  which  he  has 
bought,  or  manure  which  he  has  himself  concocted. 
Indeed,  fixed  capital  may  be  compared  to  a  breed 
of  artificial  horses,  or  if  we  like  the  simile  better,  to 


314  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  IV     a  race  of  iron  slaves.     The  amount  of  wealth  which 

Chapter  2  1  •  i  i  1 

the  employment  of  a  machme  adds  to  the  amount 

that   would   be    produced   without   it   by   a   given 

These  impie-    numbcr  of  labourcrs,  is  produced  by  the  machine 

ments  are  like    .,..  ,  .  -,,..,  ,. 

a  race  of  iron  itseli  just  as  truly  as  it  would  be  11  the  machine, 
arfpTo^du^ers  instcad  of  a  structure  of  wheels  and  framework, 
as  truly  as  live  ^qq"^  ^hc  form  of  a  gang  of  artificial  negroes,  who 

negroes  would  00  o  ' 

be.  only  betrayed  the  fact  that  they  were  not  human 

by  the  heat  of  their  breath,  an  occasional  unearthly 
whistle,  and  the  different  language  in  which  they 
required  to  have  their  orders  given  them.  The 
machine  produces  this  increment,  but  certain  men 
produced  the  machine ;  and  therefore  the  increment 
is  in  reality  produced  by  the  men,  just  as  truly 
as  when  a  murdered  man  has  been  killed  by  a 
bullet  from  a  rifle,  his  death  has  been  caused 
by  the  murderer  who  aimed  and  discharged  the 
weapon. 

Indirectly,  And  what  is  truc  of  fixed  capital  is  true  of  wage 

wage  capital  is  ,  ^       '■  ^     '-' 

also  a  producer  capital  also ;  for  fixed  capital,  such  as  machines, 
way.  buildings,  or  railways,  is  the  result  of  wage  capital, 

as  employed  to  direct  labour,  and  is  therefore  wage- 
capital  externalised  in  the  objective  results  of  its  em- 
ployment. But  fixed  capital,  or  a  man's  productive 
power  externalised,  differs  from  his  productive  power 
when  exercised  by  himself  through  wage  capital.  It 
is  a  part  of  his  power  which  he  can  separate  from 
his  own  personality,  and  which  he  can  make  over 
to  others,  just  as  a  slave-owner  might  make  over 
a  body  of  slaves ;  only  these  are  slaves  whose 
enslavement  does  them  no  wrong,  and  who  belong 


CAPITAL   IS  FOSSILISED  ABILITY  315 

by  rio^ht  to  the  men  whose  enterprise  and  whose     ^^^'^  '^ 

.  -'         ^  ^  Chapter  2 

intellect  created  them. 

Capital,  then,  as  such,  is  as  true  a  producer  of ''^"'^, '"^^^^ 

^  '  '  '  ,  ^        ,  till  they  saw 

wealth  as  the  men  were  who  in  the  first  instance  that  this  argu- 

,  ,      .  ,  ,  f      ,1  ment  could  be 

produced  it;  and  when  one  of  them  passes  a  turned  against 
portion  of  it  on  to  his  son,  and  with  it  the  income  ^asTtrongV' 
that  results  from  it,  this  income  is  nothing:  that  is  "^e.^'d  by  the 

o  socialists. 

stolen  from  other  men,  but  is  simply  a  part  of  the 
product  produced  by  the  artificial  slaves,  the  use  of 
whom  other  men  for  their  own  advantage  borrow, 
and  who  rightly  belong  to  the  lender  because  he  has 
received  them  from  his  fathers,  who  created  them. 
And  should  any  socialist  quarrel  with  this  reason- 
ing, it  will  be  sufficient  to  point  out  to  him  that  it 
is  neither  more  nor  less  than  the  reasoning  which, 
till  only  a  few  years  ago,  the  leaders  of  socialism 
themselves  were  never  weary  of  employing.  Capital, 
said  Lassalle,  is  merely  labour  fossilised :  and  so 
long  as  labour  was  held  to  be  the  only  wealth- 
producer,  the  socialists  urged  that  capital  belonged 
to  the  labourers,  because  it  represented  the  labour 
of  their  fathers,  whose  heirs  they  were.  But  with 
the  gradual  disappearance  of  the  doctrine  that 
labour  is  the  sole  producer,  it  is  becoming  more 
and  more  evident  that  capital  is  not  what  Lassalle 
thought  it  was  —  that  it  is  not  fossilised  labour,  but 
fossilised  business  ability.  In  other  words,  it  does 
not,  except  in  its  earliest  stages,  represent  on  the 
part  of  producers  a  process  of  exceptional  saving. 
What  it  does  represent  is  a  process  of  exceptional 
production.     Since  then  the  labourers,  as  labourers, 


3i6  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  IV     would  have  been  the  rightful  heirs  to  all  capital, 

Chapter  2  °  r  ' 

if  all  capital  had  been  produced  by  the  common 
labour  of  their  parents,  those  who  have  actually 
inherited  it  must  be  its  rightful  owners  in  fact, 
because  in  fact  it  has  been  produced  by  the  ability 
of  the  exceptional  men  who  left  it  to  them. 
Practically,  g^t  the  wholc  of   this  argument,  based  on  the 

however,  the  .  .  .  '-'  !•      i 

justification  of  claims  of  abstract  justice,  would  avail  very  little  to 
capital  defend  the  income  of  the  mere  owner  of  capital  if 

his  position  rested  upon  its  abstract  justice  only, 
and  if  his  right  to  his  income  did  not  form  a  part 
of  the  very  conditions  that  render  the  production  of 
wealth  possible.  The  part  which  the  right  to  income 
from  capital  plays  when  the  ownership  of  the  capital 
is  divorced  from  any  active  employment  of  it,  de- 
pends on  the  fact  that  the  right  to  income  of  this 
kind  is  what  gives  to  wealth  the  larger  part  of  its 
value,  and  renders  the  desire  of  it  efficient  as  a  social 
motive. 

The  ways  in  which  it  does  this  are  many  and 
various;  and  because  it  is  impossible  to  indicate 
them  in  any  simple  or  single  formula,  certain  people 
may  imagine  that  they  have  no  importance.  Such 
people  might  as  well  argue  that  no  complicated 
process  is  an  important  process,  or  that  no  results 
are  necessary  when  many  causes  combine  to  produce 
them. 
rests  on  the  The  most  obvious  of  the  reasons  why  the  right 

fact  that  the  .  .       -      .  •  i  f        1 

power  of         to  income  from  capital  forms  in  the  eyes  oi    the 

Sme*°  ^'^^"^  exceptional  wealth-producer  a  principal  element  in 

the  desirability  of  the  wealth  produced  by  him  has 


INCOME-YIELDING    CAPITAL  317 

its  root  in  the  facts  of  family  affection.     In  spite  of     Bookiv 

"'  ^  '■  Chapter  2 

the  selfishness  which  distinguishes  so  much  of  human 

action,  a  man's  desire  to  secure  for  his  family  such  is  what  mainly 

.  .  makes  men 

wealth  as  he  can  is  one  of  the  strongest  motives  of  anxious  to  pro- 
human  activity  known ;  and  the  fact  that  it  operates  "*^^"' 
in  the  case  of  many  who  are  otherwise  selfish  shows 
how  deeply  it  is  engrained  in  the  human  character. 
It  may,  indeed,  be  regarded  as  a  kind  of  selfishness 
itself;  and  the  vigorous  and  practical  men  who 
have  exceptional  faculties  for  wealth-production  are 
precisely  those  in  whom  it  is  strongest  and  most 
persistent.  Men  like  these  would  never  for  a 
moment  tolerate  an  arrangement  which  permitted 
the  head  of  the  family  to  keep  his  wife  and  children  since  if  in- 

"^  ,      ^  come-yieldmg 

in  luxury  so  long  as  he  lived,  but  would  condemn  capital  could 
all  of  them,  the  moment  he  happened  to  die,  to  be  "nd  be-""^'" 
turned  by  the  butler  and  footmen  into  the  street  as  Shy"^' 


men 


hpCTcarS  could  make  no 

&o         *  ...  provision  for 

It  has  been  said  that  this  family  feeling  on  the  their  families, 
part  of  the  great  wealth-producer  may  be  regarded 
as  a  species  of  selfishness  ;  and  there  is  nothing  very 
recondite  in  the  process  by  which  it  comes  to  be  so. 
Such  a  man,  no  matter  how  selfish,  values  his  family 
because  it  happens  to  be  his  own.  His  own  im- 
portance is  enhanced  by  the  success  and  brilliancy 
of  its  members ;  and  the  possession  of  a  fashion- 
able wife,  and  a  popular  and  well-bred  son,  reflects 
almost  as  much  credit  on  him  as  the  possession  of  a 
gentleman  for  his  grandfather.  For  this  reason,  if 
for  no  others,  he  will  do  for  them  everything  that 
exceptional  wealth  will  enable  him  to  do.     Wealth, 


3i8 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  IV 
Chapter  2 


nor  would 
wealth  give 
pleasure  to 
those  who 
might  at  any 
moment  be 
beggars. 


however,  depends  for  its  effects  on  those  who  enjoy 
it,  not  merely  on  its  present  enjoyment,  but  on  the 
prospect  of  its  continued  possession ;  and  unless  the 
man  who  is  making  a  fortune  by  his  ability  may 
bequeath  to  one  of  his  children,  at  all  events,  a 
position  similar  to  his  own,  and  something  excep- 
tional in  the  way  of  wealth  to  all,  the  money  which 
he  spends  on  them  during  his  own  lifetime  will 
be  wasted.  The  whole  social  importance  which 
wealth  might  have  given  them  would  be  gone.  The 
tastes  and  the  peculiar  cultivation  which  wealth  is 
capable  of  securing  for  those  who  are  from  their 
earliest  years  surrounded  with  it,  they  would  under 
such  circumstances  neglect  to  acquire  at  all ;  or,  if 
they  did  acquire  them,  they  would  be  living  in  a  fool's 
paradise,  for  when  their  father  died,  and  their  wealth 
consequently  vanished,  they  would  be  infinitely  worse 
off  than  those  who  had  never  possessed  it.  They 
would  resemble  nothing  so  much  as  plants  that  had 
been  grown  in  a  conservatory,  merely  that,  when  on 
the  point  of  flowering,  they  might  be  bedded  out.  in 
the  frost. 

If,  then,  for  the  selfish,  or  even  the  heartless 
parent,  wealth  would  in  most  cases  lose  the  larger 
part  of  its  attractions  unless  it  could  be  accumulated 
and  bequeathed  to  others  in  the  shape  of  income- 
yielding  property,  for  the  normally  affectionate  parent 
its  attractions  would  be  reduced  yet  further. 

But  the  full  part  which  heritable  incomes  play,  in 
rendering  wealth  desirable  in  the  eyes  of  exceptional 
men,  is  not  to  be  understood  by  considering  such  a 


SOCIALISTS   ON  INVESTMENT  319 

man  and  his  family  singly.     For  the  life  and  the     Bookiv 

.  °  -^  .  Chapter  2 

ambitions  of  a  family  are  not  self-contamed.  They 
imply  and  depend  upon  relations  with  other  families ; 
and  these  other  families  will  be  valued,  and  inter- 
course with  them  will  be  rendered  possible,  not  by  the  Moreover,  if 

,  .  ,  .  incomes  were 

bare  fact  that  they  are  the  possessors  of  so  much  not  heritable, 
money,  but  by  the  fact  that  they  have  the  habits  and  producrn"one 
interests  which  result,  and  result  only,  in  the  social  °^ '^f^^  ^°f"*' 

'  J  '  results,  such  as 

atmosphere  created  by  a  number  of  assured  incomes,  continuous 

,  culture,  etc., 

wholly  independent  of  any  daily  struggle  to  make  which  make  it 
them.  It  is  easy  to  see  that  no  rich  society  would  be  ^^"* 
endurable  if  the  only  men  in  it  were  men  who  had 
just  made  their  fortunes,  and  if,  on  their  deaths,  their 
families  disappeared  from  it  in  the  gulfs  of  destitu- 
tion. Anything  more  exquisitely  ludicrous  than  the 
socialistic  proposal  that  great  wealth-producers  should 
be  allowed  large  incomes  to  spend,  but  that  they  must 
not  on  any  account  be  allowed  to  invest  any  part 
of  them,  or  use  it  in  a  way  by  which  more  income 
may  result  from  it  —  anything  more  ludicrous  than 
this  it  is  not  possible  to  conceive.  It  is  —  to  recur 
to  an  illustration  used  already  —  like  proposing  that 
a  peasant  who  is  more  industrious  than  his  neigh- 
bours shall  be  allowed  all  the  money  which  the  sale 
of  his  extra  produce  brinp:s  him,  provided  only  that  The  wealth 

that  ceased 

he  spends  it  on  brandy,  or  beer,  or  absinthe;  but  with  the  men 
that  if  he  saves  it  up  and  buys  a  useful  horse  with  madriMvouid 
it,  his  purchase  shall  be  confiscated  by  the  State,  sodt^o? 
because  a  horse  is  productive    capital.     This  pro-  ^^^^^s. 
posal,  however,  is  not  only  ludicrous  in  theory,  but 
it  would,  if  put  into  practice,  result  in  a  sort  of 


320  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  IV     society  more  vile  and  bestial  than  anythino^  which 

Chapter  a  J  11 

the  world  has  ever  known.  For  the  sole  advantage 
which  in  that  case  wealth  would  bring  to  its  pro- 
ducer would  consist  in  the  meat  and  drink  and  other 
means  of  physical  pleasure  which  he  and  his  family 
could  consume  or  enjoy  during  his  lifetime  —  before 
he  retired  to  the  grave,  and  his  wife  and  children 
to  the  workhouse. 
Wealth  is  Xhc   main  value   of  wealth  in  the   eyes  of   the 

desirable  .        .       ,  .     . 

because  it  is  great  wealth-produccr  does  not  consist  m  its  mmis- 
brsiso7anen- tering  to  brief  spasms  of  self-indulgence,  but  in  the 
largedhfe;      £^^^  ^£  -^^  being  thc  foundatiou  of  an  equable  and 

sustained  life,  in  which  the  physical  pleasures  are 
refined  rather  than  intensified,  and  the  time  em- 
ployed by  the  majority  in  producing  the  necessaries 
of  existence  is  given  not  to  sloth,  but  to  other 
kinds  of  exertion.  A  life  of  this  kind  is  impossible 
except  in  a  society  of  which  a  large  section  not  only 
and  there  must  possesscs  Wealth,  but  is  accustomcd  to  its  possession, 

thus  be  con-  i      .  1  •        i     1  1-1 

tinuityinthe  and  IS  characterised  by  accomplishments,  tastes, 
weaiS!'°"°  principles,  and  kinds  of  knowledge,  which  can  be 
developed  and  acquired  only  when  the  continuance 
of  its  possession  is  assured.  In  other  words,  those 
men  on  whose  exceptional  business  ability  the  pro- 
ductive processes  of  the  entire  community  depend, 
and  who  are  the  cause  of  growth  in  the  incomes  of 
the  mass  of  the  community,  just  as  truly  as  they 
are  the  producers  of  their  own  fortunes,  are  motived 
to  activity  less  by  the  desire  of  the  wealth  which 
comes  to  them  day  by  day  through  their  own 
direct  exertions,  and  which  would    cease  instantly 


/ 


INTEREST  AS   THE  DESIRED  PRODUCT      321 
when   these  exertions    were    suspended,  than    they     boouiv 

■^  •'        Chapter  2 

are  by  the  desire  of  wealth  that  shall  come  to  them 
indirectly,  not  as  the  product  of  their  exceptional 
exertions  in  the  present,  but  as  the  product  of  the 
accumulated  product  of  their  exceptional  exertions 
in  the  past  —  the  product  of  those  stored-up  forces 
with  which  they  have  enriched  the  world,  and  which, 
whilst  rendering  help  to  thousands  of  men  besides,  "eat^^lauh- 
will  continue  to  render  a  tribute  to  their  creators  pro^^ucer 

demands  the 

and  their  creators'  children.  possession  not 

,_,,  ,  .       .      ,    f  1    r         M*        only  of  what 

1  hus,  to  express  the  matter  m  briei  and  ramiliar  he  produces 
language,  the  sustained  development  and  exercise  ^hath^epro-° 
of  exceptional  ability  in  wealth-production  implies  fg"j,^^f^^hrl!u  h 
the  possession  by  those  who  monopolise  this  ability,  ws  past 

iri  •  ri  1  i'i    products. 

not  merely  of  that  portion  or  those  products  which 
are  called  the  wages  of  superintendence,  but  also 
to  that  portion  which  is  called  interest  on  capital. 
For  just  as  the  control  of  capital  affords  the  only 
means  by  which,  under  free  institutions,  the  great 
man  can  apply  his  faculties  so  as  to  increase  the 
production  of  wealth,  so  does  the  right  to  interest, 
or  to  the  products  of  the  capital  accumulated  by 
him,  constitute  the  chief  reward  by  the  desire  of 
which  the  exercise  of  his  faculties  is  stimulated. 

There  is  a  further  point,  however,  which  now 
remains  to  be  noticed.  When  it  is  said  that  the 
great  wealth-producer  is  motived  mainly  by  the 
desire  to  enjoy  an  amount  of  wealth  proportionate 
to  what  is  produced  by  him,  it  is  not  asserted  that 
in  order  to  gratify  this  desire  it  is  necessary  that 
he  should  be  able  to  appropriate  the  whole  of  what 


322  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  IV     is  produced  by  him.     On  the  contrary,  of  that  con- 
stantly  growing   product   which    is  added   by  the 
The  majority    great    mau's  facultics  to  the   product   of   ordinary 

not  only  may,  r         i   •    i         i  •  r       i 

but  do  acquire  labour,  and  out  01  which  the  income  oi  the  great 

a  share  of  the  ,  •  •  i  i  ft,' 

increment  pro-  TCidLVi  comcs,  3.  portion  IS  Capable  OI   being  appro- 

ducedbythe  plated  bv  the  ordinary  labourers  themselves.  In- 
great  man  \       ^  -^  •' 

deed,  the  masses  of  the  community  are  partakers  in 
material  progress,  and  have  an  interest  in  material 
progress  solely  because,  as  an  actual  fact,  a  consider- 
able percentage  of  this  added  product  goes  to  them; 
and  though  few  of  our  so-called  "  labour  leaders  " 
recognise  this  truth,  all  the  hopes  of  enrichment 
which  they  hold  out  to  their  followers  imply  nothing 
whatever  beyond  the  securing  a  larger  amount  of 
an  increment  which  is  produced  not  by  themselves 
but  others.  An  important  question,  therefore, 
arises  in  this  way  as  to  how  far  the  product  of  the 
great  men  can  be  taxed  and  handed  over  as  a 
bonus  to  average  labour  without  weakening  the 
but  whatever    motivcs  which  prompt  the  great  men  to  produce  it. 

this  share  may  .      .  .  i.  •    r.     i         v      ,      •        • 

be.  it  can  never  1  his  IS  a  qucstion  to  which,  by  u  pviori  reasoning, 
rend'e^r^socil'i  ^^  is  absolutcly  impossiblc  to  give  any  definite 
conditions       auswcr.     It  is  a  question  that  can  be  solved  only 

equal.  ... 

by  cautious  practical  experiment ;  and  the  answer 
will  vary  constantly  with  times,  places,  and  circum- 
stances. All  that  can  be  asserted  here,  and  it  is  all 
that  requires  to  be  insisted  on,  is  that  the  amount  of 
wealth  which  the  exceptional  wealth-producer  can 
secure  must  be  proportionate  to  what  is  produced 
by  him,  however  far  short  of  the  whole  of  it ;  and 
that  it  must  not  be  diminished  to  such  an  extent  as 


SOCIAL  INEQUALITIES  PERMANENT       323 
will  render  it  less  exceptional  as  the  obiect  of  an     Bookiv 

,  .    .  ,  >       1       •  Chapter  2 

ambitious  and  strenuous  man  s  desire. 

In  other  words,  that  graduation  of  social  circum- 
stances, those  differences  in  ways  of  living,  in  habits, 
manners,  accomplishments,  and  social  functions, 
which  have  their  physical  basis  in  varying  degrees 
of  wealth,  and  give  to  civilised  society  what  is  its 
present,  as  it  has  been  its  past  character  —  these 
graduations  of  social  circumstances,  which  it  is  the 
cherished  dream  of  the  socialists  to  do  away  with, 
are  indestructible  so  long  as  civilisation  lasts.  If 
they  perish,  civilisation  will  perish  also;  when 
civilisation  is  restored  they  will  reappear  along  with 
it;  and  however  they  may  be  modified  or  adjusted, 
they  can  never  be  even  approximately  effaced. 

It  is  the  facts  briefly  indicated  in  the  present 
chapter  which  the  socialists  of  to-day  are  principally 
distinguished  by  ignoring;  and  it  is  these  facts 
which  render  socialism  for  ever  impossible. 

This  truth,  when  once  generally  recognised,  will 
lead  to  many  practical  consequences,  of  which  the 
most  immediately  important  will  be  dealt  with  in 
the  following  chapter. 


CHAPTER   III 

EQUALITY    OF    EDUCATIONAL    OPPORTUNITY 

The  two  great  facts,  then,  that  have  been  elucidated 

by  our  inquiry  thus  far,  are  these:  in  the  first  place, 

all  progress  and  civilisation,  and  more  especially  all 

production  of  wealth,   results  from   a  complicated 

process  in  which,  man  for  man,  a  minority  plays  a 

part   incalculably  greater  than  the  majority ;    and 

consequently,   in    the    second   place,   the   minority, 

man  for  man,  possess  wealth  that  is  correspondingly 

greater  than  the  wealth  of   the  majority,  likewise. 

In  addition  to  these  facts  a  third  has  been  elucidated 

also,  to  which  it  is  desirable  that  we  should  give 

renewed  attention.     Since  great  men  not  only  pro- 

The  wealthy     ducc  wcalth  dircctly,  but  produce  it  indirectly  by 

inheritance,  is  produciug  wcalth  which  produccs  it,  and  which  they 

moren^met    ^rc   cuablcd    to    hand    on    to    their   children,    the 

ous  than  the     wcalthv  class  is  at  any  particular  moment   always 

great  men  actu-  '  •'     ■•■  -' 

ally  engaged  at  morc  uumcrous  than  those  members  of  it  who  are 

any  given  time  n       •  i  •  t        y—  -n    •      • 

in  production,  engaged  actually  m  production.  In  Great  Britam, 
for  example,  it  has  been  estimated  that  two-thirds  of 
the  aggregate  income  that  pays  income  tax  is  rent 
or  interest  on  capital,  and  that  one-third  represents 

324 


CHANGES  IN  OWNERSHIP  OF   WEALTH      325 
the  direct  products    of  work.     We   may  therefore     boouiv 

■*■  ,  ■'  Chapter  3 

here  adopt  the  rough  hypothesis  that  out  of  each 
generation  of  our  wealthy  class  a  third  part  is  en- 
riching itself  by  the  process  of  direct  production, 
and  two-thirds  are  living  on  the  products  produced 
for  them  indirectly  by  the  capital  or  the  means  of 
production  which  were  created  by  their  fathers  and 
their  grandfathers.  Now  such  being  the  case,  what 
we  have  to  notice  is  as  follows.     Thous^h  the  mem-  But  though 

*-"  _  inheritance 

bers  of  the  wealthy  class  are  not  always  changing,  gives  a  certain 

-  Ill  •  r  '-I  •        permanence  to 

as  they  would  be  were  no  savmg  or  capital,  no  in- the  wealthy 
terest,  and  no  bequest  allowed,  they  are  still  chang-  feSlsbe- 
inff  gradually  from  generation  to  o:eneration,  so  that  io"g'"g  *«  i* 

oci  J  Q  o  are  constantly, 

whilst  the  class,  as  a  class,  always  possesses  a  nucleus  if  siowiy. 
of  families  with  whom  wealth  and  the  traditions  of 
wealth  are  hereditary,  a  number  of  individuals  born 
in  it  are  constantly  disappearing  over  its  borders, 
and  a  number  of  other  individuals  are  constantly 
passing  into  it.^ 

^The  most  permanent  form  of  hereditary  wealth  is  land;  but 
only  a  small  minority  of  our  existing  landed  families  existed  as 
landed  families  at  the  time  of  the  last  Heralds'  visitation.  Thus, 
though  the  estates  of  this  country  are  as  old  as  the  country  itself,  the 
actual  possession  of  a  large  proportion  of  them  by  their  owners,  at 
any  given  time,  represents  their  purchase  by  wealth  recently  created, 
and  is,  in  fact,  recent  wealth  converted  into  another  form. 

And  if  there  is  a  change  like  this  in  the  possession  of  landed 
wealth,  there  is  a  still  more  rapid  change  in  the  possession  of 
commercial  capital.  One  of  the  many  childish  assumptions  of  Karl 
Marx  was  the  assumption  on  which  a  good  deal  of  his  reasoning 
rests  —  that  the  English  middle  classes  of  the  present  century  owed 
their  capital  and  positions  to  social  opportunities  which  had  come  to 
them  as  the  heirs  and  descendants  of  the  merchants  and  wealthier 


way  into  it. 


326  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  IV         Thus  in  spite  of  the  permanence  which  interest 

Chapter  3  .  .... 

gives  to  wealth,  the  famihes  that  live  merely  on 
interest  are  constantly  tending  to  disappear,  and 
their  places  are  being  taken  by  the  men  whose  ex- 
ceptional faculties,  whose  business  ability,  whose 
and  new  men   enterprise   and  strenuous   will,   actually  contribute 

are  constantly  ... 

forcing  their  most  to  the  productivc  forccs  of  the  country.  It 
was  observed  by  J.  S.  Mill  with  regard  to  political 
government  that  this  "  is  always  in,  or  is  passing 
into^  the  hands  "  of  the  men  who  are  at  the  time 
the  true  repositories  of  power.  In  the  same  way 
the  wealth  of  any  progressive  country  is  always  in, 
or  is  passing  into,  the  hands  of  the  men  who  by 
their  own  abilities  are  engaged  actively  in  pro- 
ducing it. 

sheep-farmers  who  began  to  make  fortunes  four  hundred  years  ago. 
As  a  matter  of  fact  by  far  the  larger  part  of  the  great  commercial 
businesses  and  commercial  fortunes  now  existing  in  this  country  have 
been  founded  during  the  past  hundred,  and  many  within  the  past 
fifty  years,  by  men  who  were  the  sons  of  ordinary  wage-paid  labourers, 
and  who  were  no  more  heirs  to  the  men  who  formed  the  middle  class 
under  the  Tudors  than  they  were  to  the  merchants  who  are  cele- 
brated in  the  Arabian  Nights.  That  such  is  the  case  is  shown  with 
sufficient  clearness  by  the  following  figures,  which  refer  to  commercial 
incomes  during  the  thirty  years  which  followed  the  first  Great 
Exhibition.  During  these  years,  whilst  the  population  increased  by 
about  thirty  per  cent,  fortunes  of  over  ten  thousand  a  year  were 
multiplied  by  100  per  cent,  fortunes  of  from  five  to  ten  thousand  by 
96  per  cent,  and  fortunes  of  from  five  to  six  hundred  by  308  per 
cent.  It  is  obvious,  then,  that  when  a  class  is  augmented  in  one 
generation  by  a  number  of  new  members  from  three  to  ten  times  as 
great  as  its  natural  increase  would  account  for,  most  of  its  new 
members  must  have  come  to  it  from  some  class  outside,  and  have 
gained  their  place  in  it  solely  by  their  own  exertions. 


THE  ACTUALISING  OF  POTENTIAL  TALENT     327 
Such  beins:  the  case,  then,  the   material  civiHsa-     ^"o^  ^^ 

Chapter  3 

tion  of  a  country  —  the  wealth  of  the  few  or  the  pro- 
gressive comfort  of  the  many  —  depends  on  the  ex-  indeed  the 

wealth  of  the 

tent  to  which  its  potentially  great  wealth-producers,  country  de- 

as  they  come  into  the  world,  generation  after  genera- ^"rfpo^tent^riiy 
tion,  are  induced  by  circumstances  to  develop  their  5''^^' ^^  p'°', 

'  -'  ^  ducers  actu;\U 

exceptional  talents,  and  devote  them  to  the  main- 'sing  their 

.  talents  and 

tenance  and  improvement  of  the  productive  process,  producing  the 
For  those,  therefore,  who  regard  the  material  wel-  ^Ises  them, 
fare  of  a  community  as  the  test  and  basis  of  its 
welfare  in  all  other  ways,  the  abiding  social  problem 
is  always  this :  how  to  adjust  circumstances  in  such 
a  way  that  the  smallest  possible  number  of  these 
potentially  great  wealth-producers  may  be  wasted, 
and  the  largest  possible  number  may  be  induced  to 
exert  themselves  to  the  utmost. 

One  set  of  conditions  essential  to  this  result  has  it  is  therefore 
been  described  already  —  those,  that  is  to  say,  by  wealth  win 
which  the  possession   of  wealth  is  secured    to  the  ponfonas"the°e 
producers  of  it,  and  the  persons  to  whom  they  leave  grearmenhave 
it.     But  to  these  must  be  added  another  set  of  an  the  opportunity 

.....  ,  .  .  .  of  actualising 

entirely  distinct  character  —  that  is  to  say,  the  con- their  produc- 
ditions  which,  the  motive  to  exertion  being  given,  '^^p^^^""^* 
shall  render  exertion  of  the  kind  required  possible  for 
the  largest  number  who  happen  to  be  theoretically 
capable  of  it.  Now  modern  democratic  thinkers 
have  supplied  the  world  with  a  formula  by  which, 
in  their  judgment,  these  conditions  are  sufficiently 
indicated.  This  formula  is  "  equality  of  oppor- 
tunity," and  we  cannot  begin  our  consideration  of 
the  question  better  than  by  taking  this  as  a  starting- 


328 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  IV     point,  and  asklno^  what  truth  is  contained  in  it.    We 

Chapters      ^  '  »    ^  ... 

may  at  once  admit,  then,  that  if  it  is  taken  in  an 
abstract  sense,  it  sums  up  a  truth  which  is,  beyond 
doubt,  indisputable ;  for  if  each  individual  having 
exceptional  potentialities  as  a  wealth-producer, 
which  require  nothing  but  the  favour  of  circum- 
stances to  ensure  their  being  turned  into  actualities, 
could  be  provided  with  circumstances  so  nicely 
adapted  to  his  idiosyncrasies  that  these  potentialities 
might  be  developed  to  the  utmost  extent  possible, 
the  productive  powers  of  the  community,  it  is  almost 
needless  to  observe,  would  be  raised  in  that  case 
to  their  utmost  possible  efficiency.  Such  an  ideal 
condition  of  things  as  this,  however,  is  impossible 
for  the  following,  if  for  no  other  reason.  Successful 
parents  as  a  rule  will  employ  part  of  their  wealth  — 
at  all  events  they  will  employ  the  positions  which 
they  have  won  by  their  own  ability  —  to  provide 
opportunities  of  a  special  kind  for  their  sons ; 
therefore,  whatever  the  State  might  do  for  its  youths 
and  young  men  in  general,  exceptional  parents  for 
their  sons  would  be  able  to  do  something  more. 
Equality  of  opportunity,  therefore,  represents  an 
The  question  is  ideal  coudition  which  we  never  can  reach,  but  to 

how  near  we  -   .    -  ,  .  111 

can  approach   which  wc    Can    ouly   approximate ;     and  the   only 
to  equahty.      pj-actical  qucstions  for    us   are  accordingly  these : 

how  far  towards  this  ideal  can  political  action  carry 

us,  and  what  results  are  to  be  anticipated  from  our 

nearest  possible  approach  to  it } 

Now  the  answer  to  both  these  questions  will  very 

largely  depend  on  the  existing   conditions   of   the 


It  is  impossi- 
ble, however, 
to  make 
opportunities 
absolutely 
equal. 


REMOVABLE  INEQUALITIES  329 

community  with  reference  to  which  they  are  asked.     ^^^'^  'v 

T^  1  1  r  1  •    •  •    •  Chapter  3 

For  though  men  s  powers  of  equahsmg  opportunities 

are  Hmited,  their  powers  of  making  them  unequaP"a<=ou"*'"y 

,.,-.,  ,,  where  oppor- 

may  be  said  to  be  indefinitely  great ;  and  the  more  tunities  have 
unequal  they  have  been  made  at  the  time  when  we  aSfidany* 
ask  our  questions,  the  greater  will  the  progress  be  lt"n  bTioom^ 
which  there  will  be  room  for  us  to  make  towards  ^°/  ^  g""^^*  ^^""^ 

of  equahsation. 

equalising  them,  and  the  greater  will  be  the  social 
advantages  which  we  may  hope  to  secure  by  making 
it.  In  France,  for  example,  before  the  first  Revolu- 
tion, the  laws  affecting  industry  had  almost  ruined 
the  nation,  not  because  by  unduly  favouring  one  class 
they  led  to  wealth  being  concentrated,  but  because 
by  unduly  hampering  other  classes  they  prevented 
its  being  produced ;  and  the  sweeping  away  by  the 
Revolution  of  the  old  feudal  inequalities,  though  it 
had  none  of  the  millennial  effects  which  the  Revo- 
lutionists themselves  hoped  for,  has  had  others 
equally  striking,  though  of  a  very  different  kind. 
It  has  not  made  men  equal  in  point  of  wealth,  but 
it  has  increased  to  an  astonishing  extent  the  wealth 
of  all  classes  alike.  And  the  way  in  which  it  has 
done  this  has  been  by  removing  artificial  impedi- 
ments to  the  development  and  free  exercise  of 
exceptional  productive  talent;  or  in  other  words, 
by  an  equalisation  of  economic  opportunities. 

But   the   kind   of   equality  that   has    thus    been  But  removing 

1  T  -1       1  1      •  f  •        artificial  im- 

reached  may  be  described  as  being  of  a  negative  pediments  is 
rather   than  a  positive   kind.     It   depends  on  the  khido"^^^"'^ 
absence   of    artificial    impediments   to   production,  ^i^^i's^^'o"- 
rather  than  on  the  supply  of  any  artificial  helps  to 


330  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  IV     it .  which  means  that  it  depends  on  the  absence  of 

Chapters  '  ^ 

everything  that  might  obstruct  the  strong,  rather  than 
on  measures  or  institutions  that  should  artificially 
lend  strength  to  the  weak.  Now,  so  far  as  industrial 
ability  of  the  highest  kind  is  concerned,  it  is  probable 
that  this  negative  condition  of  things,  which  is 
merely  the  complete  embodiment  of  a  policy  of 
laisser-faire,  represents  the  utmost  that,  in  any 
civilised  country,  can  be  done  by  the  process  of 
equalisation  with  any  beneficial  result.  For  in 
wealth-production  the  men  whose  capacities  are 
It  is  probable,  really  of   the  first   order  will,  when  not  positively 

however  thst 

forthe  develop- impeded,  make  their  own  opportunities  for  them- 
^fThe°highesr  selves ;  and  the  genius  who  is  born  with  every 
thft^s^nledfu"  opportunity  waiting  for  him  has  but  a  few  years' 
start  of  the  genius  who  is  born  with  none.  That 
such  is  the  case  is  abundantly  illustrated  by  history. 
If  we  consider  the  most  famous  of  the  men  whose 
originality  of  mind  and  extraordinary  spirit  of  enter- 
prise have  been  chief  amongst  the  forces  which 
have  enriched  the  civilised  world,  we  shall  find  that 
those  whose  names  most  readily  occur  to  us  have  had 
no  opportunities  save  such  as  their  own  genius  made 
for  them.  Arkwright,  Cartwright,  Watt,  Stephen- 
son, the  intrepid  and  enduring  adventurers  who,  in 
the  teeth  of  prolonged  opposition,  laid  the  founda- 
tions of  the  modern  manufacture  of  iron;  Columbus, 
who  gave  to  Europe  a  new  hemisphere  —  all  these 
have  been  men  born  amongst  social  circumstances 
which  conspired  to  deny  them  rather  than  to  provide 
them  with    opportunities.     And   if   we    turn   from 


FACULTIES   OF  THE  FIRST  ORDER  331 

Europe  to  new  countries  like  America,  and  consider     b^^''  ^^ 

^  ,  .  Chapter  3 

the  leaders  of  economic  production  there,  we  shall 
find  that  the  histories  of  these  men  have  been  similar. 
Nor,  indeed,  in  this  fact  is  there  anything  to  be 
wondered  at.  In  the  sphere  of  industry,  just  as  in 
the  sphere  of  art,  the  greatest  men  will  never  be 
suppressed.  They  are  always  sure  to  assert  them- 
selves, and  the  struggle  with  adverse  circumstances 
will,  instead  of  crushing,  strengthen  them. 
I  It  may  therefore  be  safely  said  that  no  equalisation 
of  opportunity  which  goes  beyond  the  abolition  of  arbi- 
trary and  unequal  impediments  would  tend  to  increase 
the  number  of  those  exceptional  men  whose  produc-  and  win  secure 

,,.  ,,  -,_  ,  All-     ^^  develop- 

tive  faculties  are  really  of  the  first  order.     And  this  mentofaiithe 

•f  •  i_iii  iri'        genius  of  the 

inference  is  supported  by  a  large  number  or  analogies  highest  kind 
drawn  from  domains  of  activity  other  than  economic,  t'^^texisu. 
Any  workman's  boy,  for  example,  who  has  any 
taste  for  books  has  now  in  England,  before  he  is 
fifteen,  more  educational  opportunities  than  Shake- 
speare had  in  all  his  lifetime.  But  the  number  of 
Shakespeares  has  not  appreciably  increased.  Again, 
popular  education  has  given  to  the  whole  French 
army  advantages  confined  to  a  few  at  the  time  of 
Napoleon's  boyhood.  Every  private  carries  the 
marshal's  baton  in  his  knapsack.  And  yet  demo- 
cratic France,  with  all  its  equalisation  of  opportunity, 
has  not  produced  a  series  of  new  Napoleons.  On 
the  contrary,  the  mountain,  after  years  and  genera- 
tions of  labour,  does  nothing  at  last  but  give  birth 
to  a  Boulanger. 

Though  faculties  of  the  first  order,  however,  are 


332  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  IV     independent  of  artificial  assistance,  many  of  an  in- 

Chapter  3  .    "^  .  .  .  •' 

ferior,  but  still  of  an  exceptional  kind,  are  not ;  and 
But  genius  of   {^  cannot  be  doubted  that  the  supply  of  these  last 

a  lesser  kind,  ^  . 

which  would    will  depend  very  largely  on  the  degree  to  which 
may  no  doubt  faciHties  for  self-development  are  given  by  the  State 
posltivreduca-  ^^  thosc  who  dcsirc   to  take  advantage    of   them. 
tionaiheip       Tlius,  though  the  Spread  of  education  in  this  country 
has  not  increased  the  number  of  Shakespeares,  it  has 
enormously  increased  the  number  of  those  who  can 
write  good  English.     And  no  doubt  in  the  domain 
of  wealth-production  it  has  had  an  analogous  effect. 
This  effect,  however,  though  real,  has  been  enor- 
mously   exaggerated ;    and    it   has    been   exagger- 
ated for  a  particular  reason.     Social  reformers  have 
confused  two  things  together.    They  have  confused 
talents  which  are  exceptional  in  their  very  nature, 
though  the      with  accomplishmcnts  which  are  exceptional   only 

amount  of  such  •  11  1  <-m  1 

genius  is  over-  bccausc  thcy  are  not  universally  taught.     1  hus  read- 
estimated  by     •  J        'i.'         r       •      i.  T  1 
reformers.       i^g  ^^d  writmg,  lor  mstaucc,  were  rare  accomplish- 

confus^e  tafe^nts  "^^^^^  oncc.     Of  all  accomplishmcnts  they  are  the 

rare  in  them-    most  uuivcrsal  now ;  and  there  is  not  the  least  doubt 

accomplish-     that  there  are  very  many  others  which,  with  equal 

ments  that  are  ....  'Ij^i  "ii  i  i_  11 

only  rare  opportunitics,  might  bc  acquircd  by  almost  anybody, 
accidentally.  ^^^  which  yet,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  are  still  confined 
to  a  minority.  In  this  fact  that  education  may  in- 
crease the  accomplishments  of  a  community,  social 
reformers  have  fancied  that  they  discovered  an  in- 
dication of  the  extent  to  which  education  could  elicit 
exceptional  talent.  But  to  call  into  practical  activity 
by  means  of  external  help  exceptional  faculties,  of 
which  the  supply  is  necessarily  limited,  is  a  very 


TALENTS  AND  ACCOMPLISHMENTS         333 
different  process   from    evokino^  by  similar   means     ^^^'^  '^ 

.  .         .  Chapters 

faculties  which  are  potential  m  everybody,  and  the 

supply  of  which  can  be  increased  indefinitely  ;  and  1^^.  '^**^'" "" 

i^i:    J  •'    '  be  increased 

it    is    a   process,    moreover,    which    produces   very '"definitely,  the 

iTr  1  T  '  ^         ^  ^   •      '  formernot. 

dirferent  results.     Let  us  consider  how  this  is. 

For   productive   faculties   of   the  highest   order,  For  real  pro- 

,.,  .  ..  ....  .      ductive  genius 

which  not  only  minister  to  progress,  but  initiate  it,  there  is  always 
and  which  make,  as  if  by  a  conjuring  trick,  the  hands  ^°°"'' 
of  the  average  labourer  produce  new  commodities 
of  which  he  never  would  have  dreamed  himself — for 
faculties  such  as  these,  the  demand  is  always  un- 
limited. There  are  productive  faculties  also,  excep- 
tional although  they  are  inferior,  the  demand  for 
which  is  usually  greater  than  the  supply.  But  with 
regard  to  those  faculties  or  accomplishments  which 
are  only  exceptional  accidentally,  and  which  might 
be,  like  reading,  conceivably  made  universal,  the 
case  is  precisely  opposite,  and  it  is  so  for  two  reasons. 
In  the  first  place,  these  accomplishments,  which  any- 
body might  conceivably  acquire  —  knowledge  of 
French,  for  instance,  or  of  book-keeping  —  though 
they  may  minister  to  the  business  of  wealth-produc- but  the 

,1  I'll  1        economic 

tion,  yet  have  no  tendency  in  themselves  to  make  utility  of  mere 
the  business  grow.     The  number  of  persons,  then,  mentTi^ifmited 
possessing  these  accomplishments  who  at  any  given  J]^^^^  f °"'^'" 
time  can  put  them  to  a  productive  use  is  limited  by  duction  at  the 
the  condition  in  which  production  at  that  time  is. 
Thus  the  number  of  clerks  which  a  mercantile  firm 
can  employ  is   limited   by  the  business  which   the 
firm  happens  to  be  doing ;  and  though  this  business 
might  be  enlarged  by  the   enterprise  of  one  new 


334  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  IV     partner,  it  would  not  be  enlarged,  when  there  were 

Chapters      r  '  *. 

no  letters  to  copy,  by  the  accession  of  ten  young  men 
who  could  copy  letters  beautifully.  In  the  second 
place,  even  at  times  when  the  national  business  is 
growing,  and  the  demand  for  these  accomplishments 
is  for  the  moment  greater  than  the  supply,  any 
attempt  by  the  State  to  make  their  development 
general  would  produce  a  supply  indefinitely  greater 
than  the  demand.  Thus  to  multiply  the  number  of 
labourers'  sons  possessing  accomplishments  that 
Thus  to  pro-    would  fit  them  for  the  work  of  clerks  would  not  be 

duce  more  .  i  i  r  i  i  i 

possible  clerks  to  mcrcasc  the  number  of  young  men  who  would 
wanteTmereiy  wcar  black  coats,  and  sit  on  stools  in  oflfices,  instead 
wr^"?  of  those  ^^  working  in  factories,  or  laying  bricks,  or  plough- 
empioyed.       Jnor.     Instcad  of  raisinsf  the  position  of  the  plou^rh- 

without  in-  o  i  i  o 

creasing  the     boy  to  thc  samc  levcl  as  the  clerk's,  it  would  lower 
whoaren'ot°^^  thc  clcrk's  Salary  to  the  level  of  the  plough-boy's 
employed.       vvagcs  j  and  clerk  and  plough-boy  would  be  alike 
sufferers  by  the  process. 

The  beneficial  effects,  then,  to  be  looked  for  from 
an  equalisation  of  opportunity  have  been  exaggerated 
by  democratic  thinkers  because  they  have  failed  to 
perceive  those  facts.  They  have  confounded  the  de- 
velopment of  accomplishments  which  might  conceiv- 
ably be  acquired  by  all  with  the  development  of 
faculties  which,  even  potentially,  are  possessed  by 
a  few  only.  They  see  that  education  can  increase 
the  number  of  possible  clerks,  and  they  have  there- 
fore imagined  that  it  can,  with  similar  ease  and 
certainty,  increase  the  number  of  efficient  men  of 
genius.     It  must,  however,  be  distinctly  stated  that 


DANGERS   OF  EQUALISED  EDUCATION    335 
the  error  in  their  conclusion  is  one  of  exasfCfe ration     J?°°^  ^^ 

°°  .  Chapters 

only.      There    is    much    exceptional    talent    which, 
thouo^h  not  of  the  hio^hest  order,  will,  when  oppor-  pt>i'.  within 

,         .  ,  .       .      "  limits,  educa- 

tunity  is  given  it,  increase  the  wealth  of  the  com-  tionai  help 
munity,    but   which    will,    without    the  educational  does  much  to 
help  of  the  State,  be  lost ;  and  it  may  frankly  be  i"pp,y  of  ^ 
admitted  that,  within  certain  limits,  the  equalisino;  exceptional, 

'  ^  .  though  not 

of  educational  opportunity  plays  a  very  important  great,  taiem. 
part  in  supplying  the  community  with  exceptionally 
efficient  citizens. 

But  the  main  difificulties  involved  in  the  artificial  But  the  main 

.  .  1         •   1     difficulty  in- 

equalisation  of  opportunity  are  not  concerned  with  voived  in  the 
the  problem  of  how  to  produce  good  results  by  it.  educauonai* 
They  are  connected  with  the   problem  of  how  to  noMhl^pro-'^ 
avoid  producinor  bad  results.     Let  us  consider  what  Auction  of 

,  Mill  1  r    •  good  results, 

the  possible  bad  results  of  it  are.  but  the  avoid 

In  a  general  way  they  are  indicated,  or  indirectly 
implied,  in  the  saying  so  dear  to  the  sterner  and 
more  thoughtless  of  the  Conservatives — that  popu- 
lar education  does  nothing  but  promote  discontent. 
Sweeping  statements  of  this  kind,  however,  though 
they  may  have  an  element  of  truth  in  them,  are 
valueless  till  they  have  been  carefully  qualified ;  for 
what  we  have  to  ask  about  them  is  not  whether 
they  are  true,  but  how  far  they  are  true,  and  in 
what  precise  senses.  Thus,  though  it  is  true  that 
the  danger  of  diffusing  education  lies  in  the  dis- 
content that  may  thereby  be  promoted,  some  kinds 
of  discontent  are  not  dangerous — they  are  beneficial ; 
therefore  the  danger  of  diffusing  education  lies  in  its 
tendency  to  promote  not  discontent  generally,  but 


336 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  IV 
Chapter  3 


The  bad 
results  are  the 
stimulating  of 
discontent,  not 
in  average 
men,  but  in 
men  who  are 
really  excep- 
tional ; 


discontent  of  certain  special  kinds ;  and  it  is 
necessary  to  discriminate  carefully  what  these  kinds 
are. 

Now  the  kind  of  discontent  which  Conservatives 
generally  have  in  view,  when  they  denounce  educa- 
tion because  they  think  it  tends  to  promote  it,  is 
by  no  means  that  from  which  danger  really  arises. 
What  they  generally  have  in  view  is  a  discontent 
with  his  circumstances  which  they  think  education 
will  produce  in  the  average  working  man.  In 
reality,  however,  the  primary  danger  of  education  is 
not  to  be  looked  for  in  its  effects  upon  average  men 
at  all.  It  is  to  be  looked  for  in  its  effects  upon  men 
who  are  distinctly  exceptional. 

In  order  to  understand  how  this  is,  let  the  reader 
reflect  once  more  on  one  of  the  main  truths  that  have 
been  insisted  on  in  the  present  volume — namely,  that 
though  all  progress  is  the  work  of  great  or  exceptional 
men,  all  great  or  exceptional  men  do  not  promote 
progress  equally,  and  some  of  them  indeed  do  not 
promote  it  at  all.  Progress  results  from  the  victory 
of  the  fittest  of  these  over  the  less  fit  in  the  struggle 
to  gain  dominion  over  the  thoughts  and  actions  of 
others.  Let  the  reader  reflect  also  on  the  analysis 
that  was  given  of  the  various  qualities  which  go  to 
make  up  greatness  —  that  is  to  say,  the  qualities  by 
which  dominion  over  others  is  obtained.  It  was 
pointed  out  that  greatness  is  a  highly  composite 
thing ;  that  it  need  not  necessarily  imply  any  moral, 
nor  indeed  any  intellectual  superiority ;  and  as  an 
illustration  of  this  it  was  mentioned  that  many  most 


EDUCATION  AND  IMPERFECT  TALENTS     337 
important  political  movements  have  been  produced     e°o'«  ^v 

.  ,  ,      .  , .  Chapter  3 

by  men  whose  greatness  consisted  merely  m  ordmary 
sense  joined  to,  and  made  efficient  by,  an  extraor- 
dinary strength  of  will.  It  is  necessary  now  to  but  whose 
follow  this  line  of  observation  farther,  and  to  point  gmrarTnl 
out  that  if  extraordinary  strength  of  will  can  pro-  halTsome' 
duce  beneficial  effects  when  allied  with  ordinary  *^^*  >°  ^^^'°- 
sense,  it  is  equally  capable  of  producing  effects  that 
are  mischievous  when  allied  with  stupidity,  or  with 
that  kind  of  imperfect  intellect  which  is  as  quick  in 
defending  and  popularising,  as  it  is  in  being  duped 
by  fallacies.  And  with  these  latter  qualities  it  is 
allied  as  often  as  with  the  former.  It  is  a  great 
mistake  to  suppose  that  even  the  most  false  and 
foolish  opinions  which  have  influenced  multitudes 
to  their  own  detriment  have  been  originated  and 
promulgated  by  men  who  were  altogether  weak  and 
inferior.  On  the  contrary,  most  of  the  follies  which 
have  disturbed  or  retarded  civilisation  have  been 
due  to  the  influence  of  men  who,  though  morally  or 
intellectually  contemptible,  have  possessed  a  vigour 
of  character  far  beyond  what  is  ordinary. 

Now,  if  education  has  the  effect  attributed  to  it  For  if  educa- 
of  liberating  the  will  and  developing  the  intellectual  and  stimulates 
powers  of  men  in  whom  the  intellect  is  really  acute  J°cmfi 'powers 
and  sound,  there  is  an  obvious  danger  of  its  having 
the  same  effect  on  men  whose  intellect  is  unbalanced 
and  imperfect.    To  some  of  such  intellects,  no  doubt, 
it  may  give  clearness  and  equilibrium;  but  there  are  '*^'"  similarly 

1  f  1    •    1      •       1  1    •  •  stimulate 

others  for  which  it  does  nothing,  except  to  increase  intellects  that 

,  1      •  t  •  111  are  not  sound, 

their  powers  of  reasoning  wrongly;    and  when  an 


338  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  IV     intellect  of  this  kind  is  allied  with  a  naturally  strong 

Chapters  .  .  .  . 

will,  the  effect  of  education  is  to  let  loose  a  wild 
horse,  merely  in  order  that  it  may  run  away  with  a 
lunatic. 
or  will  that  has      \\  must  be  remembered  that  the  strength  of  a 

no  intellect  to  ^  .  •    i  • 

match,  and  man's  wiU,  though  depending  as  a  potentiality  on 

TdefireTr^  the  character  with  which  he  happens  to  be  born, 

who^are"n^t^"  dcpcuds  as  an  actual  force  on  his  desire  for  certain 

capable  of  obiccts  or  rcsults,  coupled  with  the  belief  that  he 

creating  it,  ■'  .  *    , 

can  attain  these  by  action.  Now,  when  a  man's 
powers  of  action  are  capable  of  realising  his  desires 
—  as  when  a  man  who  desires  to  be  wealthy  has  the 
talents  that  produce  wealth,  or  when  the  man  who 
desires  to  be  Prime  Minister  has  the  talents  of  a 
great  statesman  —  his  career  satisfies  himself,  and  is 
presumably  serviceable  to  his  country.  In  many 
cases,  however,  desire  is  exceptionally  great,  and 
generates  also  a  strong  impulse  to  act,  but  the 
capacity  for  that  kind  of  action  by  which  the  desired 
object  might  be  obtained  is  small.  Thus  many  men 
desire  exceptional  wealth,  but  find  themselves  in- 
capable of  the  peculiar  kind  of  action  that  produces 
it.  Their  will,  accordingly,  if  it  makes  them  act  at 
all,  is  like  a  steam-engine  which  merely  puts  useless 
machinery  into  motion ;  or  if  it  fails  to  make  them 
act,  as  it  very  often  does,  it  shakes  them  to  pieces 
with  a  kind  of  intellectual  retching.  These  unhappy 
persons  owe  the  condition  in  which  they  find  them- 
and  thus  will    selvcs    mainly   to   an   over-estimate    of   their   own 

merely  pro-  i        i   •  •  •  11  i 

duce  needless  powcrs ;    and    this    ovcr-cstimatc    IS   generally   the 
mSef."       direct  result  of  education,  which,  by  making  them 


WILL,  DESIRE,  AND  FACULTY  339 

falsely  imagine  themselves  capable  of  attaining  Bookiv 
wealth,  actualises  a  fruitless  desire  for  it,  which 
might  otherwise  have  remained  latent.  When 
education  has  this  effect  on  a  man  it  is  an  un- 
mitigated evil  for  himself,  and  very  frequently  for 
others. 

Again,  education,  besides  actualising  exceptional  Education, 
desires  which  are  wholly  unaccompanied  by  any  ex- lates  faculties 
ceptional  faculties  that  correspond  to  them,  actualises  produce  excep- 
desires  accompanied  by  faculties  which   are  really  bu"not""'2is 
exceptional,  and   which    produce    results    undo ubt- '^a*  are 
edly  more  than  ordinary,  but  are  nevertheless  inca- 
pable of    complete  development.      Many  men,  for 
instance,   have  gifts  for  music   and  poetry  which, 
though  genuine  so  far  as  they  go,  have  yet  some 
fatal  defect  in  them,  and  will  never  produce,  however 
devotedly  they  are  exercised,  any  results  possessing 
artistic  value.     Now  the  fact  that  progress  is  caused 
by  a  struggle  between  exceptional  men  of   course 
implies  that  some  of  them  shall   be  less  efficient 
than  the  others.     It  is  by  struggling  with  the  less 
efficient  that  the  superiority  of  the  most  efficient  is 
realised ;  and  in  order  that  it  may  be  found  who  the 
most  efficient  are,  the  inferior  as  well  as  the  superior 
must  put  their  capacities  to  the  test.     It  is  therefore 
unavoidably  one  object  of  education   to  stimulate 
the  activity  of  some  exceptional  men  whose   own 
efforts  are  foredoomed  to  ultimate  failure.     Failures, 
however,  differ  in  degree  and  kind.     Some  men  fail 
because  they  can  accomplish  nothing  of  what  they  The  progres- 

sivc  struETcrlc 

attempt,  like  the  dreamers  who  have  wasted  their  requires  that 


340 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  IV 
Chapter  3 

the  intellects 
of  some  should 
be  stimulated 
whose  efforts 
fail. 


But  those 
failures  that 
promote  prog- 
ress are  fail- 
ures that 
partially 
succeed. 


lives  in  trying  to  make  perpetual  motions.  Some  fail 
because,  though  they  accomplish  something,  others 
accomplish  more ;  and  the  production  of  what  is  the 
best  makes  the  second  best  valueless.  Thus  nine 
inventors  might  produce  nine  motor-cars,  each  of 
which  worked  well  enough  to  command  a  consider- 
able sale ;  but  if  a  tenth  inventor  was  to  produce 
another  which  was  faster,  simpler,  more  durable,  and 
cheaper  than  any  of  these,  all  the  rest  would  drop 
out  of  use  altogether,  and  be  practically  as  valueless 
as  the  mad  aggregation  of  wheels  by  which  the 
seeker  for  the  perpetual  motion  endeavoured  to 
accomplish  the  impossible.  Between  the  men 
who  fail,  however,  because  they  succeed  less  than 
others,  and  the  men  who  fail  because  they  do  not 
succeed  at  all,  there  is  a  great  practical  difference. 
The  men  who  fail  only  because  others  succeed  better 
than  they  do,  contribute  to  the  very  success  of  the 
men  by  whom  they  are  defeated ;  for  they  raise  the 
standard  of  achievement  which  these  men  have  to 
overpass.  But  the  men  who  fail  because  they  ac- 
complish nothing  waste  their  own  lives  without 
benefiting  anybody.  In  the  domain  of  economic 
production  the  truth  of  this  is  obvious.  It  is  not 
less  so  in  the  domain  of  speculative  thought.  Scien- 
tific theories  are  constantly  put  forward  which,  though 
not  true,  are  sufficiently  near  the  truth  to  have  some 
definite  relation  to  it;  and  those  who  actually  reach  it 
find  in  errors  of  this  kind  an  indispensable  assistance. 
Nothing  gives  to  truth  so  keen  and  clear  an  outline 
as  the  refuted  errors  of  really  powerful  thinkers.    But 


USEFUL   AND    USELESS  FAILURE  341 

there  are  errors,  on  the  other  hand,  which,  though     ^°°V^ 

'  '  '  o  Chapter  3 

it  may  be  necessary  to  refute  them  because  they 
have  imposed  themselves  on  a  number  of  ignorant 
people,  do  nothing  to  advance  the  discovery  of  truth 
whatever,  and  the  activity  of  those  who  originate 
them  is  altofrether  mischievous.     Thus  whilst   the 

O 

reasonings  of  heretical  thinkers  like  Arius,  by  the 
controversy  they  provoked,  were  very  largely  in- 
strumental in  advancing  orthodox  theology  to  really 
logical  completeness,  the  philosophy  of  religion  owes 
absolutely  nothing  to  Joanna  Southcote  or  the 
American  prophet  Harris.     Accordingly,  whilst  it  is  But  there  are 

^       '^  ,  ,    ,  o  y  '  ^  ^     abortive  talents 

impossible  to  say  with  precision  where  the  line  is  which  produce 
to  be  drawn  between  the  exceptional  talents  which,  have  no 
if  developed,  would   be  of   use  in  the  progressive  success. '° 
struggle    and    those    which    are   so    defective   that  These  talents 

«->o  ^  ^  ^      ^     are  purely 

their  influences  would  be  merely  mischievous,  it  is  mischievous; 
obvious  that  talent  of  this  latter  kind  is  sufficiently 
plentiful  to  render  its  development  dangerous. 

History  teems  with  examples  of  this  fact,  and  so  ^o""  example, 

•  1  r      1  •    1    T  r  *^*  failures  of 

do  the  unwritten  annals  of  the  social  life  around  us.  the  wouidbe 
Henri    Murger  in  his  studies   of    Bohemian    Paris  ^^  '^ ' 
bears  eloquent  witness  to  the  tragic  absurdity  of  the 
results   caused   by   the   development   of    imperfect 
artistic  talent,  and    the  miserable  endings  of   men 
who,  if  they  had  not  tried  to  be  artists,  might  have 
lived  and  thriven  as  honest  and  healthy  ouvriers ; 
whilst,  according  as  we  hold  vaccination    to   be  a 
blessing  to  the  world  or  a  curse,  we  must  necessarily 
hold  that  it  would  have  been  far  better  for  everybody  or  that  of  the 
if  the  talents  of  the  men  who  invented  it,  or  else  popularises 


342  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  IV     those  of   the  men  who   now  oppose  it,  had   been 
.  .  killed  by  the  frosts  of  ignorance,  and  never  allowed 

wrong  medical  ■^  *-' 

treatment.  tO  bloSSOm. 

But  the  But   the  commonest   examples  of   talent  that  is 

commonest  in  •!•  rr        iii  "i 

example  of  this  wholly  mischievous  are  afiorded  by  certain  classes 

kind  of  man  is       r  t.»     •  i  •    i  •,     ,  t^i 

the  socialistic  01  politicians  and  social  agitators.  Ihere  is  a 
agitator,  large  number  of  men  whose  potential  activity  is 
considerable,  and  whose  intellect  has  a  natural 
nimbleness  which  will  enable  them,  when  stimulated 
by  education,  to  seize  on  plausible  fallacies  and 
impose  them  both  on  themselves  and  others. 
Politicians  of  this  class  are  familiar  figures  enough. 
The  social  agitator,  whose  mental  equipment  is 
similar,  is  more  familiar  still.  Many  attempts 
have  been  made  to  give  a  scientific  explanation 
of  those  constant  attacks  on  the  existing  organi- 
sation of  society  which  are  common  to  all  civil- 
ised countries,  and  go  by  the  name  of  socialism. 
Socialism  is  said  by  some  to  be  the  protest  of  in- 
creasing poverty  against  increasing  wealth ;  by 
some  to  be  the  natural  voice  of  highly  organised 
labour,  which  has  come  at  last  to  be  capable  of  self- 
government  ;  and  by  some  to  be  an  embodiment  of 
the  esoteric  philosophy  of  Hegel.  In  reality  it  is 
the  embodiment  of  the  results  of  indiscriminate 
education  on  talents  which  are  exceptional,  but  at 
the  same  time  inefficient.  The  avowed  object  of 
socialism  is  a  redistribution  of  wealth;  but  the  most 
striking  characteristic  of  all  the  socialistic  leaders 
has  been  an  incapacity  to  produce  the  thing  which 
\  they  are  so  anxious  to  distribute.     The  wish  to  re- 


SOCIALISTS  AND  PRODUCTIVE  IMPORTANCE    343 

distribute  it  in  some  of  them  arises  from  sentiments     ^^^^^  >v 

f  r    1 1       •  •  Chapter  3 

of  benevolence ;  m  some  from  fallacious  reasonmg ; 
and  in  some  from  personal  envy ;  but  in  none  has  it 
been  accompanied  by  those  particular  faculties  on 
which  the  actual  production  of  wealth  in  large  quan- 


tities depends.   (Socialism,  therefore,  so  far  as  it  is  ^^^°  demands 

.  .  the  re-distribu- 

a  serious  theory,  is  essentially  an  attempt  on  the  tion  of  wealth 
part  of  men  who  are  themselves  economically  im-^oiuteiy  power- 
potent  to  prove  that  they,  and  others  like  them,  have  ducJ°t^^°" 
some  reasonable  right  to  possess  and  divide  amongst 
themselves  what  they  are  constitutionally  powerless 
to  make  for  themselves.)    The  result  has  been  the 
elaboration  of  a  theory  of  production  which  some- 
times declares  that  wealth  is  produced  by  "  aggre- 
gates of   conditions,"  or   "  social    inheritances "  or 
"  environments,"  as  Mr.  Spencer,  Mr.  Bellamy,  and 
Mr.  Sidney  Webb  tells  us;  and  sometimes  that  it^ndwhocon- 

-'  _  sequently 

is  produced  by  "average  labour  measured  by  time,"  invents  false 
as  Karl  Marx  tells  us,  —  the  one  doctrine  being  that  its  production 
wealth  is  produced  by  nobody,  and  that  one  man  Tng  but'^de'J^or- 
has  thus  as  good  a  ri2:ht  to  it  as  another;  the  other  ^''^^,^^°^f?;^^° 

.       ,  ^  ,  are  duped  by 

being  that  it  is  produced  in  equal  quantities  by  them 
everybody,  and  that  everybody  on  that  ground  has 
a  right  to  an  equal  quantity  of  it.  Both  doctrines 
agree  in  this,  that  they  altogether  miss  and  divert 
the  attention  of  the  mind  from  the  forces  and  condi- 
tions on  which  wealth-production  depends  in  reality. 
Now  if  the  elaboration  of  these  fallacies  had  been 
confined  to  men  who  were  capable  of  presenting 
them  in  a  really  arguable  form,  and  if  they  had  been  (though  even 

1,11  ,1  1  .  ,     these  theories 

promulgated  only  amongst  classes  who  were  capable  can  be  dis- 


344  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  IV     of   passing   a   scientific   judgment   on    them,    they 
might  have  played  —  and  within  limits   they  have 
cussed  with      played  —  a   valuable   part    in    eliciting    the    truth 
certain  circum- opposed   to  them.     But  they  have  become  wholly 
stances).         mischievous  when,  through    the   agency   of   indis- 
criminate education,  they  have  influenced  men  who, 
whilst  wanting  in  intellectual  judgment,  are  never- 
theless endowed  with  a  potential  activity  of  charac- 
ter, and  who,  when  this  is  developed,  at  once  become 
powerful  agents  in  disseminating  fallacies  amongst 
others  even    less  capable  of  criticising  them  than 
themselves.    Thus  many  of  the  leaders  of  the  "  new 
unionism "   in    England    are    to   be   credited   with 
energy  of  a  really  remarkable  kind;  but  unfortu- 
nately   the    energy    is    united    to    such    defective 
intellectual  powers,  that  the  more  vigorously  these 
are  employed,  the  more  mischievous  and  absurd  is 
the  result.     The  general  resolutions  that  have  been 
passed  at  Trade   Union  conferences  declaring  that 
no  progress  is  possible  till  all  the  means  of  produc- 
tion shall  have  been  nationalised,  or  the  doctrine 
of  the  "new  unionists"  that  wages  control  prices, 
are  all  results  of   the  exercise  of  faculties  which, 
though    in    some    respects    doubtless    superior    to 
those  of  the  average  man,  had  far  better  have  never 
been  developed  at  all. 
Men  like  these      It  is  mcn  Hkc  thcsc  —  the  men  with  ill-balanced 
two^cwef^^     or  abortive  talents  —  the  men  with  strong  wills  and 
dangers  of  the  defcctivc    intellccts,    thc    mcn    whose    ambition    is 

artificial  equal- 
isation of        developed  by  the  smallest  educational  stimulus,  but 

educational  .        ,  ,  .  .... 

opportunity,     who  have  no  talents  proportionate  to  it  which  any 


USELESS    WANTS  AND   TALENTS 


345 


education  could  develop  —  it  is  men  like  these  who     ^°°^  ^v 

.   1     .  .       .       ,     ,  ,  T        •  r      Chapter  3 

invest  With  its  principal  dangers  the  equalisation  of 
educational  opportunity ;  and  if  education,  as  so  many 
Conservatives  say,  really  does  nothing  but  promote 
popular  discontent,  it  promotes  discontent  amongst 
the  great  masses  of  the  population  less  from  the 
manner  in  which  it  affects  the  average  man  directly, 
than  from  the  manner  in  which  it  affects  men  who 
are  inefficiently  exceptional,  and  who,  not  having 
the  gifts  that  would  enable  them  to  rise  in  any 
society,  endeavour  to  persuade  the  masses  that 
society,  as  at  present  constituted,  is  an  organised 
conspiracy  of  the  few  to  keep  everybody  else  down. 

The  equalisation  of  educational  opportunity  has, 
therefore,  two  dangers  —  the  danger  of  developing 
wants  in  the  average  man  which  could  never  be 
generally  satisfied  under  any  social  arrangements, 
and  the  danger  of  developing  the  talents  of  a  certain 
class  of  exceptional  men  which  are  naturally  incom- 
plete, and  which  the  more  fully  they  were  developed, 
would  only  become  more  mischievous  both  to  their 
possessors  and  to  society.  y^ 

And  these  dangers  correspond  with  the  two  objects  namely,  the 
for  the  sake  of  which  the  equalisation  of  educational  average  man 
opportunity  is  advocated.     One  of  these  objects  is  he  cannor 
the  raisino^  the  condition  of  the  averasre  man ;  the  ^T^^\  ^^^  *^^ 

o  o  '  stimuiatmg  of 

other   is    the   securins^,   alike   for   himself   and  for  ^^'ents  that  are 

1        r    11   1  /-         r      1  'IT  r      1       constitutionally 

society,  the  full  benefit  of  the  potential  gifts  of  the  imperfect 
exceptional    man.     The    average   man,  however,  is 
not  made  better  or  happier  by  being  filled  in  early 
life  with  importunate  wants  and  propensities  which 


346 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  IV 
Chapter  3 


The  latter  of 
these  dangers 
is  the  source 
of  the  former. 


It  cannot  be 
conjpletely 
avoided,  but 
present 
theories  of 
education  tend 
to  heighten,  not 
to  minimise  it. 


The  current 
theory  that  all 
talents  should 
be  developed 
is  false ; 


he  will,  when  he  comes  to  maturity,  be  unable  to 
gratify ;  nor  is  any  one  made  better  or  happier  by  the 
development  of  gifts  which,  however  exceptional, 
can,  by  reason  of  their  incompleteness,  do  nothing 
but  give  currency  to  error,  or  initiate  abortive  action. 

It  is  the  latter  of  these  dangers  that  is  practically 
the  source  of  the  former.  The  average  man  would, 
as  has  been  said  already,  probably  suffer  little  from 
over-development  under  existing  systems  of  edu- 
cation if  it  were  not  for  the  effects  of  these  systems 
on  inefficiently  exceptional  men  whose  superiorities 
ought  never  to  be  developed  at  all.  It  is  doubtless 
impossible  to  avoid  this  danger  completely.  If 
educational  opportunities  are  to  be  of  a  kind  that 
will  enable  the  efficiently  exceptional  to  work  their 
way  to  the  top,  and  advance  or  maintain  civilisation 
by  their  influence  or  domination  over  others,  it  is  in- 
evitable that  a  certain  proportion  of  the  inefficiently 
exceptional  will  be  induced  to  develop  their  unhappy 
capabilities  also ;  but  the  number  of  these  may,  at 
all  events,  be  reduced  to  a  minimum.  The  funda- 
mental fault  of  contemporary  educational  theories  is, 
that  in  proportion  to  the  completeness  with  which 
they  were  carried  out,  they  would  tend  to  raise 
the  number  of  these  men  to  a  maximum.  And  the 
reason  why  they  would  have  this  tendency  is  that 
they  are  founded  on  two  absolutely  false  principles. 

The  first  of  these  principles  is,  that  whatever 
potential  talents  any  man  may  possess,  it  is  desirable 
to  assist  and  encourage  him  to  develop  them  to 
the  utmost.     The  second  is  that  the  type  of  educa- 


RELATIVITY  OF  EDUCATION  347 

tlon  and  culture  to  which  education  generally  should,     J?°°^  ^^ 

.  .  Chapters 

so  far  as  is  possible,  be  assimilated,  is  the  kind  of 
education  and  culture  that  is  actually  prevalent 
amongst  the  rich. 

It  is  impossible  to  meet  these  principles  with  too 
emphatic  a  negative. 

The  first  of  them  is  false  because,  as  has  just 
been  shown,  there  is  a  large  amount  of  really 
exceptional  talent  which,  if  developed,  would  work 
nothing  but  mischief,  and  which  ought,  conse- 
quently, for  the  sake  of  everybody,  not  to  be 
developed,  but  suppressed.      The  second   is   false  so  is  the  theory 

,  , ,  ,  ,  111    ^^^^  ^^'  tastes 

because   all   tastes  and   talents   are  good   or   bad,  shouM  be 

fir  1  T  i.        i.1  cultivated  in 

useful  tor  a  man  or  useless,  accordmg  to  the  con-  an  aiike.  The 
ditions   under  which   his   life  will   be  passed ;   and  ^d""=^"°" 

i  '  proper  for  the 

the  conditions  of  the  rich  are  altogether  exceptional,  rich  is  not  a 
Societies  have  existed  in  which  they  have  been  exception. 
enjoyed  by  nobody.  It  would  be  impossible  to  con- 
struct a  society  in  which  they  should  be  enjoyed  by 
more  than  a  few.  The  attempt,  therefore,  to  give 
to  everybody  a  rich  man's  education  is  like  includ- 
ing skating  in  the  curriculum,  and  fur  coats  in  the 
wardrobe,  of  a  thousand  boys,  when  nine  hundred 
of  them  are  to  spend  their  lives  in  the  tropics. 

Both  these  false  principles  rest  on  that  radically  These  false 

.,  ,  ,  .  ,.,..,  ..,,.  theories  rest  on 

false  theory  of  society  which  it  is  the  principal  object  the  false  belief 
of  the  present  volume  to  expose  —  the  theory  that  Iducl^ion 
civilisation   is  the  product  of   men    approximately  ^^^l^l^^^^^^ 
equal  In  capacities,  and  that  In  proportion  as  these  s°ciai  condi- 
equal  capacities  have  equal  opportunities  of  develop- 
ment, there  will  naturally  be  an  approximation  to  an 


348 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  IV 
Chapter  3 


The  majority 
of  each  class 
will  remain  in 
the  class  in 
which  they 
were  born. 


Only  the 
efficiently  ex- 
ceptional can 
rise  out  of  their 
own  class ; 


equality  of  social  conditions.  The  facts  of  the  case 
are  precisely  the  reverse  of  these.  Civilisation 
originated  in,  and  is  still  maintained  by,  men  whose 
capacities  are  unequal  to  those  of  the  majority ;  and 
just  as  there  is  no  tendency  towards  equality  in 
capacity,  so,  for  reasons  which  have  been  explained 
in  the  last  chapter,  there  is  no  tendency  towards 
equality  in  social  conditions.  Inequalities  of  con- 
dition may  at  some  times  be  greater  than  at  others, 
but  the  fact  that  at  times  they  show  a  tendency  to 
become  less  is  no  more  a  sign  that  they  have  any 
tendency  to  disappear  than  the  fact  that  an  economy 
has  been  effected  in  the  consumption  of  coal  on  board 
a  steamship  is  a  sign  that  steam  has  a  tendency  to  be 
generated  without  fire.  It  is  therefore  a  scientific 
certainty  that  of  each  generation  of  children  in 
every  civilised  country  the  majority  will,  throughout 
their  subsequent  lives,  occupy  positions  very  different 
from  those  of  the  few.  Most  of  the  members  of 
each  class  will  remain  in  the  position  in  which  they 
were  born;  but  there  will  be  a  gradual  descent  from 
the  upper  classes  of  their  weaker  members  into  the 
lower,  and  amongst  the  stronger  members  of  the 
lower  classes  there  will  be  a  constant  potential  desire 
to  push  their  way  into  the  upper.  Some  of  these  last 
are  strong  in  potential  desire  only.  With  others  the 
strength  of  desire  is  accompanied  by  corresponding 
talent,  by  means  of  which,  if  developed,  the  position 
which  they  desire  will  be  obtained.  It  will  be 
obtained  by  the  talent  of  these  men,  because  the 
talent   of   such   men    is   creative ;    and  when    it   is 


RELATIVITY  OF  OPPORTUNITY  349 

developed    it  renders    those  who  possess  it  actual     ^°'''^  ^'^ 

.    .  ....  .  Chapter  3 

additions  to  the  civilising  forces  of  the  community. 
With  regard,  then,  to  exceptional  men,  the  object 
of  education  should  be  to  stimulate  the  ambitions  of  ^"l!!.'^'^*. 

ambition  of  the 

those  of  them  whose  talents  are  efficient,  whilst  dis-  efficiently 
couraging  the  ambitions  of  those  whose  talents  are  only  that  it  is 
inherently  defective.     The  stronger  the  ambitions  of  [rstfmuiatT. 
the  former  are,  the  better  for  themselves  and  for  the 
community.     Men  like  these  are  the  true  gold-mines 
of  their  country.     The  stronger  the  ambitions  and 
the  larger  the  opportunities  of  the  latter,  the  more 
will  the  health  and  strength  of  the  social  organism 
be  interfered  with. 

With   reo:ard  to  the  averasfe  man,  the  obiect  q{'^^ ^-^^^^^zj 

'->  .  .  m2.v\.  should  be 

education  should  be  to  develop  in  him  such  tastes  or  taught  to  aim 

...  ...  .....  ,      ,        at  embellishing 

accomplishments  as  will  assist  him  in  the  work  by  his  position, 
which  he  is  to  live,  and  enable  him  to  make  the  most  fJom i"^^^*"^ 
of  such  means  of  enjoyment  as  are  within  his  reach, 
whilst  leaving  him  untormented  with  a  desire  for 
enjoyments  that  are  beyond  it ;  and  the  crucial  fact 
on  which  it  is  necessary  to  insist  is  that  the  circum- 
stances of  different  classes  are  permanently  and 
necessarily  different,  and  that  for  the  average  man 
of  each  class  the  education  that  will  make  the  most 
of  his  life  is  necessarily  different  also. 

In  other  words,  the  only  true  equality  of  educa- 
tional opportunity  is  an  equal  opportunity  for  each, 
not  of  acquiring  the  same  knowledge  or  developing 
the  same  faculties,  but  of  acquiring  the  knowledge 
and  of  developing  the  faculties  which,  given  his 
circumstances  and  given  his  natural  ca^Dacities,  will 


350  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  IV     (Jq  most  to  make  him  a  useful,  a  contented,  and  a 

Chapter  3 

happy  man. 

Unfortunately  these  conclusions,  simple  and  ob- 
vious as  they  seem,  run  directly  counter  to  that 
entire  theory  of  society  which,  with  more  or  less  con- 
sciousness, and  with  more  or  less  precision,  is  held  by 
the  school  of  writers,  reformers  and  politicians,  who 
suppose  themselves,  in  some  exclusive  sense,  to  have 
social  progress  at  heart;  and  also  to  that  mass  of 
diffused  sentiment  which,  though  not  expressing 
itself  formally  in  any  theoretical  propositions,  has 
that  theory  as  its  foundation,  and  bears  to  it,  as  a 
political  force,  the  same  relation  that  vapour  bears  to 
water.  These  conclusions,  therefore,  which  imply 
inequality  in  capacity  as  the  cause  of  social  progress, 
and  inequality  in  social  circumstances  as  the  neces- 
sary and  permanent  conditions  of  it,  are,  like  most  of 
the  other  conclusions  put  forward  in  this  work,  certain 
to  be  met  with  objections  of  the  most  vehement  kind, 
which  it  will  now  be  necessary  for  us  fairly  and 
carefully  to  consider.  We  shall  find  that,  as  we  do 
so,  the  entire  arguments  of  the  present  work  are 
summed  up  and  brought  together  before  us ;  and 
however  incompatible  they  may  be  with  the  false 
conception  of  progress,  of  class  relationships,  and 
of  the  structure  of  society  generally,  which  are  at 
present  mischievously  popular,  they  form  the  founda- 
tion of  hopes,  for  all  classes,  far  more  solid  than 
those,  the  fallacy  of  which  they  aim  at  demonstrating. 


CHAPTER   IV 

INEQUALITY,    HAPPINESS,    AND    PROGRESS 

Man  does  not  live  by  wealth  alone,  and  progress  is 
not  concerned  solely  with  the  production  and  the 
distribution  of  it.  But  the  processes  involved  in 
the  production  and  distribution  of  wealth,  though 
far  from  being  coextensive  with  all  social  progress, 
are  typical  of  it.  They  form,  moreover,  the  sub- 
ject with    regard  to  which    contending   politicians  The  radical 

1  r  j'ii-*'  1-1*     politician  will 

and    reiormers    practically   jom    issue ;    and    it   is  object  to  the 
mainly   because    inequality    in    the    possession    of  c°usfo°ns1n°"' 
wealth  is  affirmed  to  be  a  permanent  and  necessary  ^^^""^  ^ith 

...  .  "^   which  we  are 

feature  of  civilisation,  that  the  conclusions  here  put  familiar. 
forward  will  be  attacked. 

The  objections  that  will  be  brought  against  thern 
will  take  two  forms :  one  being  the  form  which  will 
be  given  them  by  the  radical  or  socialistic  politician ; 
the  other  the  form  which  will  be  given  to  them  by 
the  radical  or  socialistic  theorist. 

The  radical  or  socialistic  politician,  whether  he 
is  journalist  or  popular  orator,  will  express  them  by 
asserting,  in  a  tone  of  contemptuous  irony,  that 
these    conclusions,    whilst     highly    satisfactory    to 

351 


352  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

chT^ter^  ^^^  fortunately  placed  minority,  bring  but  cold 
comfort  to  the  majority ;  that  they  represent  an 
attempt  "  to  put  the  clock  of  progress  back,"  and 
that  the  masses  of  mankind  are  not  very  likely  to 
accept  them.  He  will  probably  go  on  to  say  that 
they  are  merely  a  prose  rendering  of  the  well-known 
lines  which  the  sarcastic  radical  loves  — 


God  bless  the  squire  and  his  relations, 
Teach  us  to  know  our  proper  stations ; 

which  last  request  to  the  radical  seems  to  be  the 
very  height  of  absurdity ;  and  he  will  end  his  attack 
by  appealing  to  our  electioneering  instincts,  asking 
us,  if  we  take  away  the  hopes  to  which  at  present 
the  masses  cling,  what  new  hopes  or  promises  we 
propose  to  put  in  the  place  of  them  ? 

The  radical  or  socialistic  theorist,  as  distinct  from 
the  militant  politician,  will  express  these  same  objec- 
tions in  a  more  logical  form,  thus :  He  will  remind  us 
The  radical     that  in  our  analysis  of   social  action  we  represent 
p^utThesrsame  ^^^  attainment  of  an  exceptional  position,  and  more 
objections       especiallv  of  an  exceptional  amount  of  wealth,  as 

more  logically.  . 

If  the  desire     thc  solc  motivc  that  can  be  counted  on  to  induce' 

of  exceptional  .  ,  ,  ,  ,  ,      . 

wealth  is  really  cxceptional  mcu  to  dcvelop  and  use  their  powers. 
motfve^h^wiii  Now  this,  he  will  urge,  is  tantamount  to  declaring 
foiiowfthat  ^^^^  exceptional  wealth  is  naturally  regarded  by  men 
most  men,       as  thc  main  condition  of  happiness  ;  and  since  it  is 

since  they  can-  .  ,  •  i  i   i  i  11 

not  all  be  obvious  that  exceptional  wealth  can  be  possessed  by 
ric"  must^  ^  the  few  only,  we  are,  he  will  say,  convicted  of  teach- 
mSabie""^'"  iug  that  social  progress  involves  a  denial  of  happi- 


EQUALITY  AND    GENERAL  PROGRESS      353 

ness  to  the  vast  majority  of  those  amongst  whom     ^°°^'^ 
social  progress  takes  place ;  which,  the  critic  will  go 
on  to  say,  is  absurd. 

Now  even  if  the  conclusions  we  are  discussing 
did  involve  in  reality  all  those  consequences  which 
would  be  so  depressing  to  the  majority  of  mankind, 
yet  to  prove  the  conclusions  depressing  would  not 
be  to  prove  them  false ;  and  few  enthusiasts  will 
deny  that  the  object  of  sociological  inquiry  is  not 
to  reach  conclusions  which  are  inspiriting,  but  to 
reach  conclusions  which  are  true.  As  a  matter  of 
fact,  however,  the  conclusions  now  in  question  have 
by  no  means  that  depressing  tendency  which  the 
radical  and  the  socialist  will  impute  to  them. 

For,  in  the  first   place,  none  of   the  arguments  Now  the  first 
contained  in  the  present  work  have  been  invoked  fs^Tauhe 
to  prove,  or  have  any  tendency  to  prove,  that  the  ^en'trntlver 
many,  as  distinct  from  the  few,  in  any  pro2:ressive  ^"^  equally 

-'  '^10  wealthy  does 

country,    may   not   reasonably   look    forward    to   a  not  prevent 

.  ,      .  ...  the  conditions 

contmuous  improvement  m  their  condition  —  to  aofaiimen 
greater  command  of  the  comforts  and  luxuries  of  [ng'^SXi'y. 
life,  together  with  a  lightening  or  a  lessening  of  the 
labour  necessary  to  procure  them.  On  the  conr 
trary,  the  majority  may  look  forward  to  an  improve- 
ment in  their  circumstances  which  it  is  as  impossible 
for  us  to  imagine  distinctly  at  the  present  time  as 
it  would  have  been  for  our  grandfathers  to  imagine 
the  telephone  or  the  phonograph.  All  that  has 
been  urged  in  this  work  is  as  follows :  That 
whatever  may  be  the  new  advantages  which  the 
majority  of  mankind  attain,  they  will  attain  them 
23 


354 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  IV 
Chapter  4 


Another 
answer  is  that 
if  ineqaality  in 
the  possession 
of  the  most 
coveted  prizes 
of  life  implies 
misery 
amongst  the 
majority,  this 
evil  would  be 
intensified 
rather  than 
mitigated  by 
socialists,  who 
would  substi- 
tute unequal 
honour  for 
unequal 
wealth. 


not  by  any  development  in  their  own  productive 
powers,  but  solely  by  the  talents  and  activity  of  an 
exceptionally  gifted  minority,  who  will  enable  the 
ordinary  man  to  earn  more  whilst  labouring  for 
fewer  hours,  because  they  will,  by  directing  his 
labour  to  more  and  more  advantage,  secure  from 
equal  labour  an  ever-increasing  product.  The 
conclusion,  therefore,  is  not  that  the  majority  in  any 
progressive  community  may  not  look  forward  to 
indefinitely  better  conditions,  but  merely  that  their 
condition  will  not  depend  on  themselves,  and  that, 
though  the  conditions  of  all  may  be  bettered,  they 
will  never  be  even  approximately  equal. 

What,  then,  of  the  argument  that,  however  condi- 
tions may  be  bettered,  yet  if  exceptional  conditions 
are  still  objects  of  exceptional  desire,  the  want  of 
these  objects  of  desire  will  cause  a  sense  of  privation 
amongst  the  majority .? 

To  this  really  important  question  there  are  two 
answers. 

The  first  is,  that  the  conclusion  now  before  us 
—  the  conclusion  that  certain  of  the  most  coveted 
prizes  of  life  will  always  be  for  the  few  only  — t^ 
whatever  may  be  its  consequences,  true ;  and  that 
its  truth  is  nowhere  more  clearly  evidenced  than  in 
the  ideal  State,  as  presented  to  us  by  the  extremest 
socialists.  For  we  shall  find  that  whatever  in  the 
way  of  equalised  incomes  these  statesmen  of  cloud- 
land  promise  to  their  imaginary  citizens,  they  do 
not  even  suggest  that  the  most  coveted  social  prizes 
shall  be  distributed  more  equally  than  they  are  at 


HONOUR  AS  A  SUBSTITUTE  FOR    WEALTH     355 
the   present    moment.      They,   as    has   been   said     ^°°^  ^^ 

,  ,  Chapter  4 

already,  though  they  consider  themselves  the  apos- 
tles of  equality,  recognise  that  the  prosperity,  and, 
above  all,  the  wealth  of  the  community,  will  depend 
on  their  securing  the  very  ablest  of  their  citizens 
as  members  of  the  bureaucracy  by  whom  all 
labour  will  be  directed;  and  they  recognise  that 
these  able  men,  like  the  present  race  of  employers, 
will  not  develop  their  ability  without  some  special 
inducement.  They  accordingly  propose  to  reward 
them,  not  by  allowing  them  to  retain  any  ex- 
ceptional portion  of  the  wealth  which  they  are 
instrumental  in  producing,  but  by  investing  them 
with  exceptional  honour;  and  the  desire  for  such 
honour,  say  the  socialists,  as  a  motive  to  exceptional 
effort,  "  will  be  incalculably  more  efficacious "  than 
the  desire  for  wealth.  Now  if  those  who  make  this 
assertion  attribute  to  it  any  serious  meaning,  they 
must  mean  that  men  like  honour  much  better  than 
they  like  wealth  —  that  they  covet  it  more  keenly, 
that  they  will  struggle  more  desperately  to  win  it, 
and  are  more  exasperated  at  not  possessing  it.  If, 
however,  great  wealth  is  possible  for  the  few  only, 
and  if  the  majority  of  mankind  are  for  ever  destined 
to  be  without  it,  such,  with  regard  to  honour,  is  the 
case  even  more  evidently.  For  honour  is  more  essen- 
tially confined  to  the  few  than  wealth  is.  We  can,  at 
all  events,  conceive  a  community  composed  wholly 
of  millionaires,  supported  in  luxury  by  battalions  of 
labouring  automata ;  but  it  is  impossible  to  conceive 
a  community  wholly  composed   of   men  on  whom 


356  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  IV     honour  is  conferred  as  the  choicest  prize  of  life,  and 

Chapter  4  .  ^  . 

all  of  whom  —  the  exceptional  and  the  ordinary  — 
enjoy  it  to  the  same  degree.  The  essence  of 
honour  is  distinction  or  differentiation ;  and  it  forms 
a  motive  for  the  exceptional  actions  of  the  few  only 
because  it  is  withheld  from  the  many  whose  action 
is  not  exceptional.  Either,  then,  in  the  socialistic 
State  the  honour  that  is  to  form  the  reward  of 
exceptionally  able  men  will  fail  to  stimulate  their 
abilities  and  attract  them  into  the  ranks  of  the 
bureaucracy  because  it  is  not  of  itself  so  keenly 
desired  as  wealth  is ;  or  if,  as  the  socialists  say,  it  is 
desired  even  more  keenly,  and  if  it  consequently 
does  stimulate  exceptional  men  to  struggle  for  it,  the 
socialistic  bureaucracy,  with  its  honours,  will  excite 
amongst  the  mass  of  the  citizens  incalculably  more 
envy  than  the  rich  excite  amongst  the  poor;  and 
the  millions  of  average  men  will  be  rendered  by 
the  want  of  honour  incalculably  more  miserable 
than  they  could  be  by  want  of  wealth.  If,  therefore, 
inequality  in  the  possession  of  external  goods,  for 
which  many  men  struggle,  and  which  only  a  minority 
can  secure,  necessarily  means  unhappiness  for  the 
larger  part  of  the  community,  this  evil  at  all  events 
is  not  due  to  the  existing  structure  of  society,  but  is, 
on  the  contrary,  so  rooted  in  the  constitution  of 
human  nature,  that  even  the  wildest  and  completest 
schemes  of  social  reform  are  unable  to  offer  us  so 
much  as  a  mitigation  of  it. 

The  second  answer  to  the  objection,  however,  is 
of  quite  a  different,  and  of  a  far  more  reassuring. 


EQUALITY  OF  DESIRE  357 

character.     It  is  that  the  entire  supposition  on  which     ^'^°^  ^^ 

.  .  --r-i  1  •  Chapter  4 

the  objection  rests  is  untrue.     The  external  prizes  of 

life,  of  which  exceptional  wealth  is  the  type,  thoucfh  '^^^  ''"=^' 

.  ''  '-'      answer  is  that 

struggled  for  by  many  with  every  faculty  they  the  unequal 
possess,  though  valued  by  those  who  achieve  them,  weahh"h!^"no 
and  though  recognised  by  men  in  general  as  some-  Sen"? toTause 
thing  of  which  everybody  would  choose  to  be  the  ""^^pp'""^  • 
possessor  if  he  could  be,  do  nevertheless  amongst 
average  human  beings  not  cause  any  unhappiness 
by  their  absence  at  all  corresponding  to  the  satisfac- 
tion which  they  cause  notoriously  by  their  presence. 
Such  an  assertion  will  to  many  people  probably 
seem  self-contradictory.  But  if  it  does  so,  this  will 
simply  be  owing  to  the  fact  that  the  whole  science 
of  the  subjective  conditions  of  happiness  has  been 
utterly  neglected  by  sociological  writers  hitherto. 
The  assertion  here  made,  however  paradoxical  it 
may  sound,  embodies  one  of  the  most  important 
truths  which  can  claim  the  sociologist's  attention; 
and  though  it  cannot  be  called  self-evident,  every 
student  of  social  science  should  be  familiar  with  it. 
It  forms,  indeed,  the  pons  asinorum  of  all  social 
psychology.  A  brief  elucidation  of  it  will  be  enough 
for  our  present  purpose. 

There  is  a  certain  minimum  of  external  goods,  the  for  men's 

,  .  .  desires  vary. 

desire  for  which  has  a  physiological  basis,  and  causes  There  is 
when  unsatisfied,  misery,  disease,  or  death.     Chief  desire  for  the 
amongst  such  goods  are  food  and,  in  most  climates,  Jfe^'onTyTfor*^ 
clothes  and  shelter.     So  far  as  this  minimum  is  con-  ti^'^  desire 

rests  on  men  s 

cerned,  the  desires  of  all  are  practically  equal ;  and  physical 
they  are  equal  because  they  arise  out  of  that  physical  are  similar; 


358  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  IV     constitution  which  we  cannot  alter,  and  in  respect  of 

Chapter  4  ,  .       .  '■ 

which  we  are  all  similar.     But  for  external  goods 
but  the  desire   ^]^at  are  bcvond  this  minimum  men's  desires  vary 

for  superflui-      ._.,,,  ,  ,,  , 

ties  depends  on  indefinitely;  and  they  vary  because  they  depend  on 
powere.  which  the  action  of  the  imagination  and  the  intellect,  which 
var>-.  varies  in  different  men,  and  in  the  same  men  under 

different  circumstances. 

In  civilised  countries  the  minimum  of  goods 
desired  is  practically  not  limited  to  the  bare  neces- 
saries of  existence,  and  it  is  difficult  to  define  it  with 
anything  like  absolute  precision.  But  without  any 
formal  definition  of  it,  it  is  at  all  events  sufficiently 
The  special  distiuct  to  enable  us  to  place  in  contrast  with  it  those 
luxury  is  obviously  unnecessary  goods  which  make  up  wealth 
UJfnd  and  the  ^^^  luxury.  Now  luxury  is  very  commonly  supposed, 
imagination—  '^^  coutradiction  to  what  has  just  been  asserted, 
to  represent  materialism  in  its  most  exaggerated 
form,  and  thus  to  offer  a  contrast  to  competence 
or  modest  comfort.  And  it  does,  no  doubt,  rest 
on  a  material  basis ;  but  competence  and  modest 
comfort  do  so  likewise.  An  arm-chair  which  costs 
perhaps  thirty  shillings  is  as  material  as  one  which, 
on  account  of  its  artistic  workmanship,  costs  four  or 
five  times  that  number  of  pounds.  But  so  far  as 
wealth  and  luxury  transcend  comfort  and  competence, 
and  possess  those  peculiar  qualities  which  are  held 
to  render  them  enviable,  what  they  appeal  to,  and 
what  they  are  measured  by,  is  not  their  effect  upon 
the  senses,  but  their  appeal  to  the  imagination  and 
the  mind.  We  can  easily  see  this  by  considering 
very  simple  examples,  which  will  show  us  that  the 


THE  RELATIVITY  OF  LUXURY  359 

same  external  thino^s  are  luxuries  or  not  luxuries     Bookiv 

.  1*11  'I  Chapter  4 

according  to  the  way  in  which  the  mind  regards 
them.  Thus  a  man  will  be  called  luxurious  if  his 
house  is  of  palatial  proportions,  if  he  lives  under  «he  luxury,  for 

,     .  ...  ,  ,  1   •     •  n  T~>        instance,  of  a 

lofty  ceilings  and  treads  upon  shining  floors.  But  large  house, 
the  luxury  which  the  owner  finds  in  existing  amongst 
these  surroundings  consists  not  in  any  physical  effect 
which  they  produce  upon  his  senses  as  he  moves 
amongst  them,  but  in  a  great  variety  of  complicated 
relations  which  exist  between  them  and  his  own 
life,  past  and  future,  and  of  which  the  senses  take 
no  account  at  all.  Were  this  not  so  the  poorest 
and  most  destitute  might  daily  enjoy  a  luxury 
superior  to  that  of  the  millionaire  by  strolling 
through  the  halls  and  corridors  of  our  great  public 
institutions,  of  which  many  are  far  finer  than  the 
most  maafnificent  private  houses.  A  man,  aq-ain,  ^'^'^^P'^e 
will  be  thought,  and  will  think  himself,  luxurious  if  dationina 
he  travels  from  Paris  to  Monte  Carlo  in  a  sleeping 
compartment  with  sheets  and  pillows ;  and  passen- 
gers who  have  ordinary  places,  if  they  are  sensitive 
to  social  contrasts,  will  glare  through  the  windows 
enviously  at  the  occupant  of  this  paradise,  who  has 
probably  had  to  pay  a  hundred  francs  to  enter  it. 
But  let  us  only  imagine  that  the  sleeping  compart- 
ment is  taken  off  its  wheels  and  is  permanently 
planted  by  the  side  of  some  street  or  road.  It  will 
then  form  a  bedroom  which  the  owner  of  the  petti- 
est villa  would  hardly  venture  to  assign  to  a  maid- 
of-all-work ;  whilst  if  three  workmen  had  to  sleep  in 
it  instead  of  three  first-class  passengers,  the  agitator 


36o 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  IV 
Chapter  4 


Consequently 
the  desire  for 
luxury  and 
wealth,  like 
the  pleasure 
they  give, 
depends  on 
peculiar  mental 
powers  or 
peculiar 
mental  states. 


would  point  to  It  as  an  example  of  the  horrors  of 
overcrowding.  When,  therefore,  the  sleeping  com- 
partment is  admitted  —  as  it  is  admitted  —  to  be  a 
luxury,  it  is  admitted  to  be  so  because  it  is  regarded 
in  relation  to  a  variety  of  circumstances  to  which  the 
senses  are  quite  blind,  and  which  are  realised  by  acts 
of  the  mind  and  the  imagination  only.  And  with  all 
wealth  and  luxury  the  case  is  just  the  same.  Like 
comfort  and  competence,  they  have  material  things 
for  their  foundation ;  and  the  material  foundation 
that  supports  them  is  no  doubt  necessarily  larger. 
But  what  renders  them  more  desirable  is  not  the 
additional  material  in  itself,  but  the  qualities  with 
which  it  is  invested  by  the  subtle  craftsmanship  of 
the  mind. 

Just,  then,  as  wealth  and  luxury  depend  on  the 
intellect  and  the  imagination  for  the  larger  part  of 
the  pleasure  which  they  give  to  those  who  possess 
them,  so  does  the  desire  for  them  amongst  men  in 
general  depend  on  the  action  of  the  intellect  and  the 
imagination  also.  Hence,  though  a  desire  for  wealth 
is  popularly  supposed  to  be  universal,  and  in  a  cer- 
tain sense  is  so,  it  is  a  desire  the  non-satisfaction  of 
which  causes  a  sense  of  privation  only  when  the  im- 
agination and  the  intellect  work  in  an  exceptional 
way.  Let  us  take,  for  example,  some  community  on 
the  outskirts  of  civilisation  which  continues  to  main- 
tain itself  in  rude  plenty  and  comfort,  but  to  which 
wealth  and  luxury  are  merely  remote  ideas.  If  a 
stranger  suddenly  came  within  its  borders  carrying  a 
bag  which  had  in  it  a  hundred  thousand  pounds,  and  if 


SPECULATIVE  AND  PRACTICAL  DESIRE    361 
he  placed  this  bag  on  the  summit  of  a  neighbouring     2°°''  ^^ 

•  1  •i*»ir*  1  Uhapter  4 

mountam  and  promised  to  give  it  to  the  first  man  who 
should  get  hold  of  it,  every  member  of  this  simple 
community  who  was  not  lame  or  bed-ridden  would 
start  for  the  mountain  as  fast  as  his  legs  could  carry 
him,  and  the  slopes  would  soon  be  the  scene  of  a  mad 
and  breathless  scramble.  But  if  no  such  stranger 
came  bringing  the  image  of  wealth  close  to  them, 
or  if  instead  of  placing  his  bag  on  the  summit  of  a 
neighbouring  mountain  he  showed  it  to  them  through 
a  telescope  hung  up  in  the  moon,  not  a  single  heart 
amongst  them  would  beat  quicker  at  the  thought  of 
it  or  suffer  a  single  pang  from  the  knowledge  that 
it  was  unattainable. 

The  reason  of  this  is  as  follows :  Amongst  the  Amongst  most 

f  1*11  ^       '        f  11"  '"^^  ^^  desire 

great  masses  oi  mankind  the  desire  for  wealth  is  a  for  wealth  is 
speculative   desire   only.      They   give,   if   we   may  specSi'twe 
borrow  an  expression  from  Cardinal  Newman,  only  ^"""^  °"^y- 
a  "  notional  assent "  to  the  fact  that  it  is  desirable. 
Wealth  means  for  them  no  special  pleasure  which 
they  have  experienced,  or  can  represent  to  them- 
selves, and  the  repetition  of  which  they  crave  for; 
nor  does  it  mean  the  satisfaction  of  any  importunate 
wants.     It  does  not  mean  for  them  what  a  shilling 
would   mean   for   a   starving   man.     For  him   the 
shilling  would  mean  the  food  for  which  his  stom- 
ach  clamoured ;    and   he   would  feel   the  want  of  ^*  'mpi'"  no 

.  .  P^'i*  caused  by 

it  as  keenly  as  he  would  value  its  possession.     So,  the  want  of 
too,  a  poor  youth  separated  from  his  family  may  *^^ 
crave  for  a  five-pound  note,  and  be  miserable  at  not 
possessing  it,  because  this  will  represent  the  possi- 


362 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  IV 
Chapter  4 


The  desire 
ceases  to  be 
speculative 
and  becomes  a 
practical  crav- 
ing only  when 
the  imagina- 
tion is  excep- 
tionally strong, 
and  a  strong 
belief  is  present 
that  the  attain- 
ment of  wealth 
is  possible. 


bility  of  spending  Christmas  with  them.  But  no 
ordinary  man,  unless  he  has  Hved  amongst  the  very 
rich,  and  his  entire  view  of  life  has  been  practically 
identified  with  theirs,  has  any  similar  craving  for  a 
hundred  thousand  pounds,  or  for  a  million ;  for  he 
has  no  personal  experience  and  no  detailed  know- 
ledge of  the  peculiar  conditions  of  life  which  require 
such  sums  to  purchase  them.  Wealth  is  to  him 
little  more  than  a  name  for  a  power  which  would 
secure  for  him,  if  he  possessed  it,  an  indefinite 
number  of  indefinite  things,  if  he  wanted  them ;  but 
he  is  under  ordinary  circumstances  no  more  troubled 
by  its  absence  than  he  is  by  the  fact  that  he  has 
not  a  fairy  for  his  godmother,  or  that  he  does  not 
happen  to  be  the  owner  of  Aladdin's  lamp. 

How,  then,  does  it  come  to  be  the  object  of  that 
keen  hunger  which  is  the  strongest  motive  to 
activity  amongst  the  men  who  are  the  chief  pro- 
ducers of  it.?  What  are  the  exceptional  circum- 
stances which  convert  it  from  a  remote  something, 
held  in  a  passionless  and  speculative  way  to  be 
desirable,  into  a  near  something,  craved  for,  and 
eagerly  struggled  for  with  the  painful  industry  of  a 
lifetime } 

The  speculative  desire  for  wealth,  common  to  all 
human  beings,  is  converted  into  this  practical  crav- 
ing by  two  causes,  which  act  and  re-act  upon  each 
other.  One  of  them  is  an  exceptionally  powerful 
imagination ;  the  other  is  the  belief  on  the  part  of 
any  given  individual  that  wealth  is  a  thing  which 
he  actually  may  acquire  if  he  will  only  make  certain 


INEQUALITIES  IN  DESIRE  FOR    WEALTH     363 

efforts,  of  which  he  beheves  himself  to  be  capable.  ^°°^  '^ 
In  cases  where  the  necessary  efforts  are  recognised 
as  long  and  arduous,  and  the  coveted  reward  as 
being  consequently  far  distant,  the  belief  of  the 
individual  that  it  is  really  possible  for  him  to  attain 
it  will  require  the  aid  of  an  exceptionally  powerful 
imagination  to  rouse  it  into  activity,  and  to  keep  it 
alive  when  roused.  In  cases  where  the  necessary 
efforts  are  obviously  extremely  slight,  and  the 
individual  believes  that  wealth  is  almost  in  his 
hands  already,  the  belief  will  stimulate  his  imagina- 
tion, however  feeble  it  may  be  naturally,  instead  of 
requiring  that  his  imagination  should  sustain  or 
stimulate  it.  Thus  the  attainment  of  wealth  being 
under  ordinary  circumstances  difficult,  and  requiring 
intense,  anxious,  and  prolonged  effort,  a  keen  desire 
for  it  is  not  ordinarily  felt  except  by  men  whose 
strength  of  imagination  amounts  almost  to  genius, 
and  in  whom  a  belief,  whether  true  or  false,  is 
developed,  that  they  are  capable  of  creating  for 
themselves  this  prize  which  they  see  so  clearly. 
Warren  Hastings,  for  instance,  if  his  imagination 
had  not  been  exceptional,  would  never  have  had 
that  vision  of  the  past  glories  of  his  family  which 
made  the  desire  of  restoring  them  the  main  motive 
of  his  career;  and  again,  on  the  other  hand,  if  some 
sudden  and  exceptional  circumstance,  such  as  the 
advent  of  an  imaginary  stranger  with  his  bag  and 
his  hundred  thousand  pounds,  should  present  every 
member  of  a  community  with  a  chance  of  acquiring 
wealth  instantly,  the  feeblest  imaginations  would  be 


364  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  IV     stimulated   to  such  a  degree,  that   all  would   find 

Chapter4  r  i  m  i 

themselves  craving  for  the  possible  prize  equally. 
The  desire  for       j^  convertinsT,  then,  a  mere   notional    assent   to 

wealth,  in  fact,  ...  ...  i-ii 

is  in  proportion  the    propositiou   that  wealth    is    desirable    into   an 

to  each  man's  ,11  r  •,  i*i'  '     c    ^       't  j_ 

belief  that  by  actual  hungcr  tor  it,  which  is  paintul  it  not 
hiTaSTie!'  satisfied,  the  essential  cause  is  a  belief  that  the 
desired  wealth  is  attainable;  and  the  intensity  of 
the  hunger  is  in  proportion  to  the  vitality  of  the 
belief.  This  important  psychological  truth  is  very 
easily  demonstrable  by  a  kind  of  experience  suf- 
ficiently familiar  to  most  people.  If  a  man  who 
has  perfect  taste,  and  a  few  thousands  a  year,  is 
buying  furniture  for  his  house,  and  is  anxious  that 
every  room  shall  be  as  beautiful  as  it  is  in  his  power 
to  make  it,  we  all  of  us  know  with  what  eagerness 
day  after  day  he  will  stare  into  the  windows  of  the 
dealers  in  old  furniture  and  bric-a-brac,  and  how 
quickly  he  will  take  note  of  any  object  that  his  taste 
approves.  Now  if  such  a  man,  having  admired  a 
cabinet  or  a  piece  of  tapestry,  finds  that  the  price 
of  it  is  a  hundred  or  a  hundred  and  fifty  pounds,  he 
will  feel  perhaps  that  it  is  a  little  beyond  his 
means;  but  he  will  dream  of  it,  long  for  it,  and 
will  never  know  a  moment's  peace  till  he  has  so 
arranged  his  expenditure  as  to  enable  him  to  com- 
plete the  purchase.  But  if  the  price  of  the  cabinet 
or  the  tapestry,  instead  of  being  a  hundred  or  a 
hundred  and  fifty  pounds,  had  been  a  thousand  or 
fifteen  hundred,  he  would  have  recognised  that  the 
objects  were  totally  beyond  his  reach,  and  though 
they  still    excited    admiration    in    him,  they  would 


THE  LAW  OF  EXPANDING  DESIRE         365 
excite   no   desire.      Here   is   the   ^reat   difference     b°°''  '^ 

.  Chapter  4 

between  the  necessaries  of  life  and  the  luxuries. 
Men  crave  for  the  former,  whether  they  are  able  to 
procure  them  or  no.  They  crave  for  the  latter  only 
in  proportion  as  they  feel  them  to  be  procurable. 
A  starving  boy  does  not  want  a  bun  the  less  because 
he  has  not  a  penny  to  buy  it  with.  A  man  of  taste, 
with  only  a  hundred  pounds  to  spend,  does  not 
crave  for  a  piece  of  tapestry  at  all,  if  he  knows  that 
the  lowest  price  for  it  would  be  not  less  than  a 
thousand. 

Now  under  normal  conditions  the  belief  that 
exceptional  wealth  is  procurable  by  them  is  confined 
to  men  with  exceptionally  vivid  imaginations  and 
with  certain  exceptional  talents  and  energies  that  This  belief  is 

1      ,         .1  nni  t  111        •      naturally  con- 

correspond    to   them,      ihey    crave    for  wealth,   m  fined  to  men 

fact,   because    they   believe   themselves  capable  of  JlonaUmagina- 
creating  it,  and  their  cravino^  keeps  pace  with  their  t'o"^  and 
belief  in  the  range  of  their  capabilities.     The  more  productive 
wealth  they  can  create,   the  more   they  desire   to  p°^^"' 
create.     Their   desire   for   wealth,    in    fact,    unlike 
their  desire  for  necessaries,  is  proportionate  not  to 
their   natural   wants,    but   to   the    extent   of    their 
natural  powers.     It  follows  what  may  be  called  the 
law   of  expanding  desire.     Here,  then,  is  the    ex- 
planation   of  the   fact   which    is    at    first   sight   so 
paradoxical  —  that   whilst  the  desire   of   wealth   is 
the  strongest  of  all  motives  amongst  a  minority,  the 
absence  of  wealth  is  not  felt  as  any  privation  by  the 
majority  ;  and  so  long  as  the  normal  conditions  that 
have  just  been  indicated  prevail,  and  the  men  who 


366 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  IV 
Chapter  4 


It  only  be- 
comes general 
by  the  popu- 
larising of 
false  theories 
which  repre- 
sent weahh  as 
attainable  by 
all,  without 
exceptional 
talent  or 
exceptional 
exertion. 


It  is  roused, 
for  instance, 
in  a  man  who 

suddenly  is 
told  that  he 
has  a  legal 
right  to  an 
estate  which 
previously  he 
never  thought 
of  coveting. 


can  really  produce  exceptional  wealth  are  the  only 
men  who  believe  it  to  be  a  thing  attainable  by 
them,  and  are  consequently  the  only  men  who  feel 
any  actual  craving  for  it,  all  goes  well  and  healthily, 
and  the  desire  of  all  classes  may  be  at  least  approxi- 
mately satisfied.  Unfortunately,  however,  the  belief 
that  wealth  is  attainable,  though  it  is  naturally  con- 
fined to  men  who  have  exceptional  powers  of  creat- 
ing it,  is  capable  of  being  implanted  under  certain 
circumstances  artificially  in  men  who  possess  no 
exceptional  powers  at  all. 

A  familiar  case  like  the  followinof  will  show  how 
this  is  effected.  A  man,  we  will  say,  occupies  an 
ornamental  cottage,  which  is  beautiful  in  itself, 
is  embowered  in  beautiful  gardens,  and  also  com- 
mands views  of  a  picturesque  and  magnificent  park, 
into  the  glades  of  which  one  of  the  gates  of  his 
garden  opens,  and  which  the  owner  allows  him 
to  use  precisely  as  if  it  were  his  own.  All  his 
friends  tell  him,  and  tell  him  truly,  that  there  is 
no  such  place  of  its  size  within  fifty  miles  of  Lon- 
don. They  envy  him  his  dainty  drawing-room,  his 
verandah  festooned  with  roses,  his  prospect  of  the 
timbered  park,  and  his  free  access  to  its  solitudes. 
His  friends  envy  him,  and  he  feels  himself  that  he 
is  enviable.  One  morning,  however,  he  receives  a 
lawyer's  letter,  which  gives  him  to  understand  that 
he  is  really  the  legal  owner,  not  of  his  cottage  only, 
but  of  the  park  and  property  adjoining,  and  that  with 
adequate  legal  assistance  he  could  certainly  substan- 
tiate his  claim  to  them.     In  an  instant  his  whole 


THE  ARTIFICIAL    CRAVING  FOR    WEALTH     367 
temper  of  mind  with  reQ:ard  to  his  surroundincrs  is     ^^o^^  ^^ 

....  .  .  Chapter4 

changed.  His  pride  m  his  cottage  is  gone,  and  its 
place  is  taken  by  indignation  at  having  been  kept 
out  of  possession  of  the  park,  and  by  a  feverish 
craving  to  acquire  it.  He  goes  to  law.  The  case  is 
long  and  difficult.  He  lives  for  months  distracted  by 
fear  and  hope ;  and  when  the  case  is  finally  given 
against  him,  he  comes  back  to  his  cottage  with  his 
mind  unhinged  by  the  shock,  contemptuous  of  the 
dwelling  which  was  once  a  source  of  pride  to  him, 
and  cursing  the  prospects  which  once  were  his  daily 
pleasure. 

Now  this  craving  for  wealth,  by  which  the  man's 
Hfe  is  blighted,  has  been  produced,  precisely  as  such  a 
craving  normally  is,  by  the  belief  on  his  part  that 
certain  wealth  is  attainable ;  but  the  belief  here  does 
not  rest  on  a  consciousness  that  he  is  able  by  his 
own  abilities  to  create  or  earn  it  for  himself ;  it  rests 
on  his  intellectual  assent  to  a  delusive  proposition 
that  he  has  a  legal  right  to  it,  or,  in  other  words.  The  socialistic 
that  the  law  will  make   him   the   possessor   of  it  day  creates  a 
without   any  exceptional   productive   effort   of   his  for^weamfby"^ 
own.     And   here   we   have   a   counterpart   to  the  '«s  doctrines 

^  _  of  impossible 

socialistic  teaching  of  to-day.  It  excites,  or  aims  at  rights  to  it. 
exciting,  an  artificial  craving  for  wealth  in  men  who 
would  not  naturally  trouble  their  heads  about  it,  by 
teaching  them  that  they  have  a  right  to  it,  which  is 
wholly  independent  of  any  exceptional  productive 
power  in  themselves,  or  in  any  ancestors  from 
whom  they  might  claim  to  inherit.  The  only 
difference  between  men  who  are  thus  deluded,  and 


368 


ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 


Book  IV 
Chapter  4 


The  practical 
craving  for 
wealth  is 
naturally  con- 
fined to  those 
who  have 
some  talent  for 
creating  it, 
and  the  pain 
caused  by  its 
absence  is 
naturally  con- 
fined to  such 
men. 


The  socialistic 
theories  merely 
cause  a  barren 
and  artificial 
discontent, 


the  claimant  to  the  park  and  estate  whose  case  we 
have  been  just  imagining,  is  that  whilst  the  latter  is 
deceived  into  expecting  that  he  individually  can 
be  made  rich  by  a  law-suit,  the  latter  are  deceived 
into  expecting  that  they  all  can  be  made  rich  by 
legislation. 

The  desire  for  wealth,  as  something  distinct 
from  competence,  is  a  desire  which  normally  affects 
men  only  in  proportion  as  they  believe  themselves 
to  be  possessed  of  power  by  which  they  may 
individually  earn  it ;  and  so  long  as  men  recognise 
the  truth  that,  apart  from  rare  chances,  the  powers 
that  earn  wealth  are  the  exceptional  powers  that 
create  it,  the  craving  for  wealth  which  makes  the 
non-possession  of  it  a  pain  is  confined  to  a  minority 
composed  of  exceptionally  constituted  individuals. 
The  absence  of  wealth  amongst  the  majority  causes 
unhappiness  only  when  false  theories  with  regard  to 
its  attainability  and  men's  natural  rights  to  it  have 
produced  in  the  average  man  an  artificial  and — 
diseased  sensitiveness.  There  is  no  surer  means  of 
exaggerating  inequalities  in  happiness  than  the  false 
and  pestilent  teachings  which  encourage  equality  of 
expectations. 

And  not  only  do  these  teachings,  so  far  as  they 
have  any  effect  at  all,  create  private  unhappiness  and 
multiply  private  disappointments,  but  they  give  rise 
amongst  masses  of  men  to  an  impracticable  temper, 
which  is  the  source  of  many  of  the  difficulties  con- 
fronting us  in  the  domain  of  politics,  and  most  of 
those  confronting  us  in   the   domain    of   industry. 


THE  MISCHIEF   OF  FALSE   THEORIES       369 
The  crude  and  childish  philosophy  which  socialists     ^"^'^  ^'^ 

>■  ^      •'  ^  Chapter  4 

and  so-called  labour-leaders  endeavour  to  diffuse 
amongst  the  great  masses  of  the  population  rests, 
so  far  as  the  masses  of  the  population  understand  it, 
on  the  theory  that  society  is  composed  of  "  approxi- 
mately equal  units,"  and  that  whatever  is  produced 
within  a  community  is  produced  by  that  community 
as  a  whole.  Hence  the  members  argue,  and  the 
socialists  distinctly  tell  them,  that  property  and 
capital  are  merely  accidental  possessions,  which  give 
to  those  who  possess  them  a  purely  adventitious 
power.  These  teachers  add  that  such  possessions,  in 
abstract  justice,  should  be  taken  from  their  present 
possessors  and  divided  amongst  the  community  at  which  inter- 

,  ,    f  ,..-,,  ,  111*  1        ^^^res  with  that 

large ;  and  from  this  it  lollows  that  all  claims  to  the  harmonious 
profits  of  capital,  as  put  forward  by  it«  present  which"he°" 
possessors,  are,  in  an  abstract  sense,  unjust,     xhe  ^^"^^"^^^"^  ^'^^ 

^  '  '  •'  many  depends, 

consequence  is  that  the  employed,  when  stimulated 
into  conflict  with  the  employers,  enter  on  the  conflict 
in  a  temper  which  forbids  them  to  be  satisfied  with 
any  immediate  result  of  it,  however  favourable  to 
themselves.  Whatever  advance  in  wages,  or  reduc- 
tion in  hours,  the  employers  may  have  conceded, 
the  employed  —  so  far  as  they  are  influenced  by  the 
socialistic  fallacies  of  the  day  —  consider  themselves 
still  wronged  almost  as  much  as  ever,  so  long  as 
the  employers  continue  to  exist  at  all ;  and  thus  any 
cordial  understanding  between  the  two  classes  is 
made  impossible.  When  the  employed  strike  or 
agitate  for  higher  wages,  they  may  be  compared  to 
a  man  who  maintains  that  his  tailor's  bill  is  ex- 
24 


370  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  IV     orbitant,  and  desires  to  have  a  certain  portion  of 
^^"^     the  total  deducted.     Now  if  the  tailor  is  reasonable 
and  agrees  to  take  off  something,  the  matter  may  be 
easily  adjusted  to  the  satisfaction  of  both  parties; 
for  though  the  customer  may  think  that  the  tailor 
has  claimed  too  much,  he  admits  that  to  a  certain 
sum  the  tailor  has  an  undoubted  right.     But  if  the 
customer  were  a  madman,  who   believed  when  he 
ordered  his  clothes  that  in  abstract  justice  he  ought  to    , 
be  charged  nothing  for  them,  and  that  any  claim  on 
the  tailor's  part  was  in  reality  robbery  and  oppres- 
sion, whatever  deduction  the  tailor  might  consent  to 
make,  the  customer's  grievance  against  him  would 
remain    the    same    as    ever.      It    is   possible    for 
customers  and   tradesmen  to  come  to  some   satis- 
factory understanding,  so  long  as  the  demand  of  the 
former  is  that   their   bills   shall  not  be  too  high. 
No  satisfactory  understanding  could  be  arrived  at 
between  them  possibly  —  there  would  be  nothingibut 
friction,  constant  dunning,  and  writs — were  it  known 
that  the  customers  entertained  and  meant  to  act  on 
These  theories  thc  thcory  that  they  ought  not,  in  abstract  justice,  to 
^fVasTes'^ho  pay  their   bills    at   all.     Now  such   is    the   labour- 
wue  berimes    leader's  theory  with  regard  to  the  employing  classes, 
and  the  cause   Yov  3.  time  somc  part  of  their  bills  must  unfortu- 

of  true  social  ^  .  r      i      '  d 

reform  suffers  natcly  be  paid  —  that  IS,  some  part  of  their  profits 
inj'ury" ""  ^  bc  allowcd  them.  But  to  these  profits  they  have  no 
real  right,  and  the  employed  must  never  be  con- 
tented until  they  have  absorbed  the  whole  of  them. 
So  long  as  such  a  theory  prevails,  no  satisfactory 
progress   in   the   condition   of   labour   is   possible, 


THE  FORCES  BEHIND    CAPITAL  371 

partly  because  the  employed,  whatever  advantages     '^°o''  ^v 

•  •111  1  i-'iiapter  4 

they  may  gam,  will  be  no  nearer  to  content  than 
they  were  before,  partly  because  the  employers  are 
constantly  forced  into  a  position  of  unwilling 
antagonism  to  men  whom  they  would  wish  to 
befriend. 

The  object  of  this   present  work,  so  far  as  the  '^^  ^^J'^^'  ^^ 

.  -.         .,         .  ,  the  present 

question  of  wealth  and  its  distribution  is  concerned,  work  is  to 
has  been  to  show  how  absolutely  false  to  fact  are  the  Lua^y  o^f  the 
theories  to  which  this  impracticable  discontent  is  due,  JJ^eSing^^'^ 
and  how  intellectually  ludicrous  is  the  position  of  the  socialistic  dis- 

1-1  1*  •  111  •        content  and 

school  of  thinkers  who  imagine  that  such  theories  socialistic 
represent  accurate  science  J  These  thinkers,  in  their  ^^^^^^  °'"' 
dealings  with  property  and  capital,  in  spite  of  the 
esoteric  admissions  of  a  certain  number  of  them  to 
the  contrary,  touch  the  truth  in  their  more  popular 
utterances,  only  by  the  process  of  inverting  it,  or  of 
putting  the  cart  before  the  horse.  They  represent 
the  employing  classes  as  possessing  exceptional 
strength  merely  because  they  are  accidentally  the 
possessors  of  capital.  The  actual  truth  is  that  these 
classes  are  possessors  of  capital  because  they  them- 
selves or  their  fathers  have  possessed  exceptional 
strength.  The  arrows  of  Ulysses  were  more  for- 
midable than  those  of  the  suitors  because  Ulysses 
shot  with  a  stronger  bow  than  they;  but  he  shot 
with  a  stronger  bow  for  the  very  simple  reason 
that  he  was  strong  enough  to  bend  it  and  they 
were  not.  The  employing  classes  contribute  to  the 
processes  of  production  not  less  than  the  employed ; 
in  certain  senses  they  contribute  incalculably  more, 


372  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book IV  and  in  every  sense  they  contribute  as  truly;  and 
Chapter  4  ^^^^  contribute  not  primarily  because  they  possess 
capital,  but  because  as  a  class  they  possess  excep- 
tional faculties,  of  which  the  capital  possessed  by 
them  is  at  once  the  creation  and  the  instrument. 
In  other  words,  the  inequalities  which  sociaUsts 
regard  as  accidental  are  the  natural  result  of  the 
inequalities  of  human  nature,  and  constitute  also  the 
sole  social  conditions  under  which  men's  unequal 
faculties  can  co-operate  towards  a  common  end. 
and  to  show         Socialists  contcud  that  the  source  of   all  power 

that  the  many     .       .  ,  i    •         i  t       •       •  mi 

are  not  a  self-   IS  HI  the  multitude.     It  IS  impossiblc  to  miagme  a 
existent  power.  gj.g^|-gj.  qj.  ^lore  abjcct  crror.     The  multitude,  or  the 

mass  of  average  men  —  the  men  undistinguished  by 
any  exceptional  faculties  —  are  the  source  of  certain 
powers,  or  rather  they  possess  certain  powers. 
That  is  true;  but  what  may  these  powers  be.^* 
Their  most  striking  characteristic  is  their  limita- 
tion. In  the  domain  of  industry  the  many,  if  left  to 
themselves,  could  produce  only  a  very  small  amount, 
which  would  have,  moreover,  no  appreciable  tendency 
to  increase.  In  the  domain  of  government  they 
could  initiate  the  simplest  movements  only,  and  carry 
out  only  the  simplest  measures.  The  powers  which 
they  actually  possess  under  existing  circumstances  are 
as  much  greater  than  these  as  the  man  is  greater  than 
the  child ;  but  these  added  powers  acquired  by  the 
average  men,  or  by  the  many,  do  not  depend  upon 
average  men  alone.  They  are  developed  only  with 
the  development  of  another  set  of  powers  altogether 
—  the  powers  belonging  to  the  exceptional  men  or  to 


THE   TWO  SOCIAL  FACTORS  373 

the  few ;  and  if  these  latter  powers  were  impaired,  the  ^°°^  ^^ 
former  would  be  impaired  also.  In  the  domain  of 
production  and  the  domain  of  government  alike,  not 
all,  but  nearly  all,  the  powers  of  a  democracy  pre- 
suppose the  powers  of  a  de  facto  aristocracy,  and 
although  they  modify  them,  they  depend  upon  them,  t-^t  depend  for 

T  T  1  r  /  1   •  ^"  *1^^  powers 

Here  are  the  two  lactors  or  forces  which  we  can  they  possess  on 
never  get  rid  of  unless  we  get  rid  of  civilisation  tVon'^^'theTe'w. 
altogether  —  the  force  represented  by  the  mass  of 
ordinary  men,  and  the  force  represented  by  those 
who  in  various  ways  are  more  than  ordinary.  Let 
us  destroy  society  a  hundred  times  over,  and  attempt 
to  reconstruct  it  in  what  way  we  will,  these  two 
forces  will  inevitably  reassert  themselves,  and  reveal 
their  existence  in  the  form  which  society  takes,  as 
surely  as  a  man's  figure  will  give  its  shape  to  what- 
ever kind  of  cloak  we  hang  on  it.  These  two  forces 
at  the  present  time  attract  our  attention  principally 
by  their  activity  in  the  domain  of  industry,  where 
they  show  themselves  under  the  forms  of  employer 
and  employed.  In  order  that  any  satisfactory  solu- 
tion of  our  industrial  difficulties  may  be  arrived  at 
it  is  necessary  that  employers  and  employed  alike 
should  each  recognise  the  importance  of  the  part 
played  by  the  other,  the  nature  and  the  extent  of  the 
other's  strength,  and  the  permanent  need  each  has 
of  the  other's  strenuous  co-operation.  It  is  hardly 
to  be  expected  that  between  these  two,  serious  dis- 
putes and  difficulties  will  ever  completely  cease.  In 
the  interest  of  social  progress  it  is  not  necessary 
that  they  should.     What  is  necessary  is  that  what- 


Book  IV 
Chapter  4 


374  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

ever  disputes  between  these  two  parties  may  arise, 
and  however  unreasonable  or  excessive  on  any 
given  occasion  the  claims  of  the  few  may  seem  to  the 
many,  or  the  claims  of  the  many  to  the  few,  neither 
party  shall  regard  the  other  as  its  opponent,  excepting 
with  reference  to  the  particular  points  at  issue ;  that 
the  few  shall  not  deal  with  the  many  as  though  the 
many,  in  asserting  themselves,  were  rebels,  nor  the 
many  attack  the  few,  as  though  the  powers  of  the  few 
were  usurpations.  What  is  necessary  is  that  each 
should  recognise  its  own  position  and  its  own 
functions,  and  the  position  and  the  functions  of  the 
other,  as  being,  in  a  general  sense,  all  equally 
unalterable,  and  although  admitting  of  indefinitely 
improved  adjustment,  not  admitting  of  any  funda- 
mental change. 

And  what  is  true  of  the  social  forcesJLhat  are  in- 
volved in  the  production  of  wealth,  is  true  of  those 
that  are  involved  in  political  government.  In 
political  government,  just  as  in  the  production  of 
wealth,  the  power  of  the  few  has  a  root  in  the 
nature  of  things  as  indestructible  as  has  that  of  the 
many ;  and  though  the  few  can  produce  progress 
only  when  the  many  can  co-operate  with  them,  it  is 
not  from  the  many  that  their  power  is  primarily 
derived.  In  the  domain  of  speculative  knowledge 
this  is  self-evident.  The  ordinary  brains  are 
pensioners  of  the  few  brains  that  are  superior  to 
them ;  and  yet  the  superior  brains  are  powerless  to 
produce  social  results,  except  in  so  far  as  the 
ordinary   brains    respond    to   what    their   superiors 


THE  RIGHTS  OF  THE  FEW  AND  THE  MANY    375 

teach  them.  So  it  is  in  economic  production,  so  it  ^°°^  ^^ 
is  in  poHtical  government.  The  power  of  democracy 
is  not  only  an  actual  power;  it  is  a  power  from 
which  no  society  can  ever  wholly  escape ;  but  never 
—  not  even  when  nominally  it  reaches  its  extreme 
development  —  does  it,  or  can  it,  or  does  it  ever  tend 
to  be,  a  power  which  is  self-existent.  It  always 
implies  and  rests  upon  the  corresponding  power  of 
the  few,  as  one  half  of  an  arch  implies  and  rests  upon 
the  other.  The  whole  object  of  the  democratic 
formulas  popular  to-day  is  to  deny  or  to  obscure  this 
fundamental  truth ;  and  no  greater  obstacle  to 
general  progress  exists  than  the  prevalence  of  the 
spirit  which  the  acceptance  of  these  formulas  en- 
genders. If  there  is  anything  sacred  in  the  rights  of 
the  poorest  wage-earners,  there  is  something  equally 
sacred  in  those  of  the  greatest  millionaires ;  and  if  whose  rights 

,        ,  1  1  r      1         •  1      •  ^"^^  ^^  sacred, 

the  latter  are  capable  of  abusmg  then-  power,  so  also  and  whose 
are  the  former;    but  nothing  will  tend  to  prevent grJ^^'^as Their 
their  abuse  of  it  so  much  as  the  recognition  that  such  °^"' 
an  abuse  on  either  side  is  possible.     If  there  is  any 
wisdom  and  power  in  the   cumulative  opinions  of 
ordinary  men,  there  is  another  kind  of  wisdom  and 
another  kind  of  power  in  the  ideas,  the  insight,  the 
imagination,  and  strength  of  will  which  belong  to 
exceptional  men ;  and  these  last,  though  they  may 
give  effect  to  what  the  many  wish,  do  so  only  be- 
cause they  represent  what  the  many  do  not  possess. 
What  is  required  to  bring  our  political  philosophy  — 
and  not  only  our  political  philosophy  but  our  political 
temper — into  correspondence  with  facts  is  not  to 


376  ARISTOCRACY  AND   EVOLUTION 

Book  IV  deny  the  power  that  has  been  claimed  during  this 
century  for  the  many,  but  to  recognise  that  this 
power  does  not  stand  alone,  and  that  those  other 
powers  represented  by  the  wealthy  few  are  not  only 
essential  to  the  wealth  of  the  few  themselves,  but 
also  to  the  prosperity,  and  most  emphatically  to  the 
progress,  of  all. 
The  recogni-        f^g  progrcss  of  all,  instcad  of  beinff  incompatible 

tion  of  the  fact       .  r       &  '  ^    ^  &  r 

that  the  reia-    with  the  fact  that  the  positions  of  all  have  no  ten- 
positions  of     dency  to  become  equal,  assumes,  on  the  contrary,  a 
never  br"      morc  and  more  practicable  aspect  in  proportion  to 
fundamentally  ^^  accuracy  with  wliich  this  fact  is  recognised ;  and 
that  such  is  the  case  shall,  in  conclusion,  be  briefly 
shown  by  reference  to  the  theory  of  progress  which 
at   present   deceives    the    socialists.      This    theory, 
which  was  formulated  by  Karl  Marx,  bases  itself  on 
the  fact,  which    is    indubitable,  that~the  industrial 
systems   of   the  civilised    races   of   the  world  have 
undergone  great  changes  in  the  past,  and  may  there- 
fore be  expected  to  undergo  changes  as  great  in  the 
future.      The    three    most    marked    stages    in    the 
sequence  of  change  referred  to  are  slavery,  feudalism, 
and  capitalism ;  and  the  practical  conclusion  drawn 
from  them  by  the  socialists  is  that  as  feudalism  arose 
out  of  slavery,  and  capitalism  arose  out  of  feudalism, 
(especially       g^  ^jjj  socialism  ansc  out  of  capitalism.     This  argu- 

when  we  con-  ^  o 

sider  the  facts  meut  is  merely  another  example  of  those  self-con- 

whichKari      fusious  by  wliich  the  socialists  are  distinguished  as 

attemionT'      reasoners.     It  is  an  argument  which  depends  for  its 

whole  apparent  point  on  the   defective  manner  in 

which  these  various  systems  —  socialism  included  — 


POWER    OF  THE  FEW  INDESTRUCTIBLE      377 

have  been  analysed.  For,  though  slavery,  feudalism,  ^^^^^  ^^ 
and  capitalism  differ  from  one  another  in  many  most 
important  points,  they  happen  not  to  differ  at  all  in 
respect  of  that  one  particular  point  in  respect  of 
which  socialism  will  have  to  differ  from  all  three 
of  them.  That  is  to  say,  in  whatever  way  these  three 
systems  differ  from  one  another,  they  all  agree  with 
one  another  in  being  systems  under  which  the  few, 
the  strongest,  the  most  intellectual,  the  most  ener- 
getic, not  only  controlled  the  actions  of  the  average 
many,  but  received  for  their  exceptional  action  a 
correspondingly  exceptional  recompense.  The  few 
who  occupied  this  commanding  position  differed,  at 
different  times,  in  the  nature  of  the  powers  which  gave 
them  the  command.  Sometimes  it  was  the  great 
fighters  who  were  paramount,  sometimes  the  great 
legislators,  sometimes  the  great  industrialists.  But 
into  whatever  mould  human  society  has  been  cast, 
with  whatever  circumstances  it  has  been  surrounded, 
and  whatever  kind  of  talent  or  strength  has  been 
most  essential  to  it  at  given  periods,  the  few  who 
have  possessed  this  kind  of  talent  and  strength  to 
the  highest  degree  have,  as  a  whole,  and  with  them 
their  families,  invariably  occupied  a  position  of  ex- 
ceptional wealth  and  power.  We  may  deplore  this 
fact  or  no,  but  the  fact  still  remains,  and  conse- 
quently the  argument  of  the  socialists  from  the 
facts  of  social  evolution,  when  reduced  to  its  true 
terms,  merely  amounts  to  this  —  that  because  many 
social  changes  have  taken  place  already,  but  one 
particular  change  in  spite  of  these  has  never  taken 


378  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  IV     place,  yet  this  particular  change  which  has  refused 
to  take  place  in  the  past  is  perfectly  certain  to  take 
place  in  the  future. 
shows  us  not        'pi^e  historical  evolution  of  society,  however,  and 

only  how  ,  1  i  i        •      i         i 

chimerical  are  thc  social  changcs  that  havc  taken  place,  do  indeed 
the  sSists.  convey  to  us  a  very  important  moral ;  but  this  moral 
gliSJJids^tSf  which  the  changes  convey  to  us  is  curiously  differ- 
are  for  the       gj^^  from  that  which  the  socialists  draw  from  them. 

hopes  of  more 

rational  They  draw  from  them  the  moral  that  because  social 

arrangements  have  been  greatly  changed,  therefore 
they  can  be  fundamentally  changed.  The  true 
moral  is  that,  although  they  may  be  changed  greatly, 
they  can  never  be  changed  fundamentally ;  and  from 
this  there  follows  another  as  its  yet  more  important 
corollary  —  that  although  social  arrangements  can 
never  be  changed  fundamentally,  they  can,  never- 
theless, be  progressively  and  indefinitely  improved, 
but  that  real  reforms  can  be  accomplished  only  by 
those  who  abandon  altogether  every  dream  of  funda- 
mental revolution.  Many  reforms  which  socialists 
eagerly  recommend,  and  many  wishes  which  socialists 
entertain,  may  meet  with  the  approval  and  sympathy 
of  the  most  determined  conservatives ;  but  the  error 
of  the  socialists  is  sufficiently  indicated  by  the  fact, 
already  remarked  upon  in  the  course  of  this  work, 
that  the  changes  which  they  advocate,  and  whose 
advent  they  delight  to  prophesy,  leave  the  possible 
and  approach  the  absolutely  impossible,  in  precise 
proportion  as  these  visionaries  set  value  upon  them. 
Nowhere  is  the  impossibility  of  such  changes 
more  clearly  indicated  than  in  the  phrases  now  most 


IMPOSSIBLE  FREEDOM  379 

frequently  used  to  indicate  their  specific  nature —     Bookiv 

T  1  7  •  •        n  1  ,         Chapter  4 

such  phrases  as  "  the  emancipation  and  "  the 
economic  freedom  "  of  the  labourer.  These  phrases, 
if  they  have  any  meaning  at  all,  can  mean  one  thing 
only  —  the  emancipation  of  the  average  man, 
endowed  with  average  capacities,  from  the  control, 
from  the  guidance,  or,  in  other  words,  from  the  help, 
of  any  man  or  men  whose  capacities  are  above  the 
average  —  whose  speculative  abilities  are  exception- 
ally keen,  whose  inventive  abilities  are  exceptionally 
great,  whose  judgments  are  exceptionally  sound, 
and  whose  powers  of  will,  enterprise,  and  initiative 
are  exceptionally  strong.  ^That  is  to  say,  these 
phrases,  if  they  have  any  meaning  at  all,  mean  the 
deliberate  loss  and  rejection,  by  the  less  efficient 
majority  of  mankind,  of  any  advantage  that  might 
come  to  it  from  the  powers  of  the  more  efficient 
minority.  "  Economic  freedom"  in  fact,  would  mean 
economic  poverty ;  and  the  "  emancipation  "  of  the 
average  man  would  merely  be  the  emancipation 
which  a  blind  man  achieves  when  he  breaks  away 
from  his  guide.  The  human  race  progresses  because 
and  when  the  strongest  human  powers  and  the 
highest  human  faculties  lead  it;  such  powers  and 
faculties  are  embodied  in  and  monopolised  by  a 
minority  of  exceptional  men ;  these  men  enable  the 
majority  to  progress,  only  on  condition  that  the 
majority  submit  themselves  to  their  control ;  and  if 
all  the  ruling  classes  of  to-day  could  be  disposed  of 
in  a  single  massacre,  and  nobody  left  but  those  who 
at  present  call  themselves  the  workers,  these  work- 


38o  ARISTOCRACY  AND  EVOLUTION 

Book  IV     ers    would  be  as  helpless  as  a  flock   of   shepherd- 
chapter  4  '■  .  .       . 

less  sheep,  until  out  of  themselves  a  new  minority 

had  been  evolved,  to  whose  order  the  majority- 
would  have  to  submit  themselves,  precisely  as  they 
submit  themselves  to  the  orders  of  the  ruling  classes 
now,  and  whose  rule,  like  the  rule  of  all  new 
masters,  would  be  harder,  and  more  arbitrary,  and 
less  humane  than  the  rule  of  the  old. 


INDEX 


Accident,  social  inequality  not  an,  47  ff. 
Activity,  five  domains  of,  154. 
Agent,  great  man,  of  progress,  121. 
Agents,  the  few  not  mere  passive,  190. 
Aggregate,  Spencer's  definition  of  an, 

52. 
Agitators,  social,  342. 
Agriculture,  Mill's  argument  concern- 
ing, 198  ff. 
Aim  of  science  to-day,  5. 
Analysis:  Kidd's,  of  social  aggregate, 
23. 

of  case  against  great  man,  63  ff. 

of  greatness,  120  ff. 

of  the  democratic  theory,  178-180. 

of  practical  reasoning,  208-211. 
Ancestors,  great  man  and,  73. 
Application :  of  science  to  society,  5. 

of  knowledge,  inventor  and,  1 38. 
Aristocrats  agree  with  democrats  and 
socialists  as  to  orderly  govern- 
ment, 43. 
Aristotle :  and  intention,  100. 

on  the  average  man,  259. 
Autocracy:  of  the  inventor,  60-61. 

of  great  man  of  business,  61. 

of  hotel-keeper,  62. 

competitive  element  in  an,  178. 
Average  men  :  action  in  co-operation, 
215  ff. 

emancipation  of,  379. 

Bellamy,  Edward,  65,  76,  77,  80,  82. 
Bessemer,  Sir  Henry,  87. 
Bimetallism,  used  for  illustration,  185. 
Birth-rate  and  socialistic  State,  232. 

38 


Brazil,  socialistic  colony  in,  232,  note. 
Browning,  Robert,  quoted,  1 24. 
Bryan,  W.  J.,  186. 
Buckle,  H.  T.,  10, 

Capacity,  degrees  of,  113. 
Capital:  fixed  and  wage,  158. 

as  a  wealth-producer,  311. 

income-yielding,  317. 

forces  behind,  377  ff. 
Capitalism  and  progress,  167. 
Capitalists:  the  first,  159. 

Marx's  conception  of,  160. 
Carlyle,  Thomas,  26,  50,  115,  215. 
Catholicism,    average     believer    and, 

226-227. 
Children  :  and  socialistic  State,  232. 

of  the  wealthy  man,  317-318. 
Chimeras,     hopes    of    socialists    are, 

378. 
Christianity  :  how  spread,  146, 

cause  of  general  acceptance,  225  ff. 
Church   of  Rome  a  religious  democ- 
racy, 228-229. 
Civilisation :  meaning  of,  23S. 

depends  on  the  great  man,  276, 
Classes:  Kidd's  division,  20-22. 

Spencer's  division,  113. 

permanent  nature  of,  348. 
Cobden,  Richard,  186. 
Collectivism  and  individualism,  14. 
Columbus  an  example  of  force  of  mo- 
tive, 274. 
Competition:  socialists  on,  168-170. 

involved  in  socialism,  171, 
Comte,  Auguste,  10. 


382 


INDEX 


Contract,  true  social,  274-275. 
Control,  how  great  man  obtains,  157. 
Co-operation:   163. 

present  inequalities  necessary  to, 

372- 
of  the  few,  373. 
Corvee,  162-163. 

Craftsmanship,  progress  and,  254-255. 
"  Cut-throat     struggle,"     competition 

termed  a,  168. 

Darwin,  Charles  R.,  4,  96. 
Deity,  social  change,  and  Spencer,  25. 
Demand :    dependent   on   the   many, 
237-238. 

a   democratic   phenomenon,   239- 
241. 

for  results  and  for  means,  242-243. 

political  and  economic,  243-244. 
Democracy :  oligarchy  compared  with, 
178.  ^ 

as  master  of  its  rulers,  l8l. 

complete,  an  illusion,  183. 

disguised  oligarchy,  187. 

and  average  faculties,  220  fF. 

religious,  a  type,  229. 

and  the  family,  232  ff. 
Desire  :  and  production,  287. 

equality  of,  357. 

law  of  expanding,  365. 
Dexterity,  not  progressive,  135. 
Discontent :  socialistic  theories  cause, 
368. 

fallacy  of  present  socialistic,  371. 
Discovery,  great  man  and,  66-67. 
Division  of  labour:  cause  of,  31. 

Spencer  on,  32. 
Domination,  struggle  for,  152. 

"  Economic  freedom  " :  economic  help- 
lessness, 174. 
economic  poverty,  379. 
Education :  dangers  of  equalised,  334- 

336. 
and  imperfect  talents,  337. 
Election,  of  a  governor,  177-180. 
Element,  military  and  industrial,  37. 


Emancipation  of  average  man,  379. 
Equality:   of  power  non-existent,  189. 

of  opportunity  impossible,  328. 
Equalisation  of  education,  345-346. 
Errors :  fundamental,  of  modern  socio- 
logical study,  I-16. 

of  Kidd,  21-23. 

of  Spencer,  25. 

of  the  socialists,  215  flf. 
Evolution  :    theory    of    development 
termed,  5. 

application  of,  to  social  science,  6. 

of  marriage,  35. 

and  intentional  progress,  95. 

the  result  of  intention,  104-105. 

of  society,  moral  of,  378. 

Fabian  Essays,  quoted,  1 65- 1 66. 
Factors:    Spencer's   external  and  in- 
ternal, 33-34. 

two  social,  373. 
Faculties:  and  results,  2I3ff. 

actualised  by  motive,  273. 
Failure,  useful  and  useless,  34I. 
Family,  the,  35,  230  ff. 
Fission,  Spencer's  process  of,  36,  41. 
Fittest  survivor  and  progress,  90. 
Formulas,  object    of   popular    demo- 
cratic, 375. 
Freedom,  economic,  174. 
Free  trade :  used  for  illustration,  147, 

185. 
Froude,  James  A.,  50. 

Genius,  definition  of,  criticised,  152. 
George  Eliot,  quoted,  271. 
George,  Henry,  18,  310-31 1. 
Government :  war  and  evolution  of,  37. 

necessary  to  production  and  com- 
merce, 156. 
Governor,  the  elected,  177-180. 
Great  Man :  autocracy  of,  in  business, 
6i. 

case  against  the,  64-65, 

debt  of,  to  the  past,  71. 

social  inheritance  of,  77  ff. 

a  true  cause  of  progress,  83. 


INDEX 


Z'^l 


Great  Man :  and  rapidity  of  progress, 

94-95- 

uses  unintended  materials,  96. 

evolution  and,  106-107. 

defined,  11 5-1 16. 

and  knowledge,  135. 

as  teacher,  136-137. 

influence  on  others,  141. 

and  wealth-production,  151  ff. 

produces  the  increment,  204-207. 
Great-man  theory :  Spencer  on,  25,  50. 

Carlyle  on,  26. 

reasonably  stated,  115. 

fundamental  proposition  implied  in, 
128. 

involves    a    competitive    struggle, 
144. 
Greatness:  many  degrees  of,  117, 

analysis  uf,  120-129. 

not  equally  beneficial,  142. 

skill  not  a  kind  of,  253. 

summed  up,  272. 

Handbook  of  Socialism,  285. 
Happiness:  progress  and,  351-353. 

speculative  and  practical,  361. 
Harrison,  Frederic,  299-300. 
Heroes,  great  men  not  necessarily,  116. 
Home,  democracy  and  the,  233-234. 
Home  Rule,  222,  note. 
Honour,  substitute  for  wealth,  355. 

Illusion,  complete  democracy  an,  183. 
Imagination,  effect  of,  on  desire,  362. 
Income,  149. 

Increment,  great  men  and  the,  206-207. 
Individualism  and  collectivism,  14. 
Industrial  civilisation,  origin  of,  31. 
Inequality :  origin  of  social,  47. 

in  capacity,  48-49. 

various  kinds  of,  11S-II9. 

social,  is  permanent,  322-323. 
Influence  :  of  social  science,  7. 

means  of  great  man's,  153. 
Inheritance  :   great  man's  social,  77. 

fact  of,  irrelevant,  79-So. 

semi-socialists  oppose,  309. 


Intellect,  compared  to  will,  125. 
Intention :  and  the  Walter  press,  103. 

evolution  result  of,  105. 
Interference  of  socialists  with  progress, 

369- 
Inventions,  socialists  and,  81. 
Inventor:  autocracy  of  the,  60-61. 

often  helpless  by  himself,  125. 

applied  knowledge  and  the,  139. 

Julius  Caesar  as  a  "  proximate  initiator," 

56. 
Jury,  trial  by,  259-260. 

Kidd,  Benjamin:   10,  11,  21-24,  291. 

his  Social  Evolution,  12,  14,  17-18, 
90-91. 

on  great-man  theory,  64-65. 
Knowledge:  basis  of  progress,  133. 

speculative,  134. 

great  man  and,  135  ff. 

inventor  and  applied,  139. 

Labour,  and  trade  unionism,  236. 

Labour-leaders,  injure  real  social  re- 
form, 370  ff. 

Land,  and  labour,  198-199. 

Lassalle,  Ferdinand,  315. 

Lavelaye,  Emile  de,  quoted,  19. 

Law  of  expanding  desire,  365. 

Laws,  demand  for,  242  ff. 

Localisation  of  industry:  cause,  31. 
led  to  road-making,  33. 

Luxury,  relativity  of,  358. 

Macaulay,  anticipates  Spencer,  69. 
Machines,  as  artificial  slaves,  313-314. 
Maine,  Sir  Henry,  259-260. 
Man:  sociologists  and,  17. 

Kidd  on,  i8ff. 

de  Lavelaye  on,  20. 

natural  character  and  progress,  t,^. 
Marriage,  evolution  of,  34-35. 
Marshall,  Professor :   11,54. 

his  Principles  of  Social  Science,  1 2. 
Marx,  Karl,  53,    160,   209,   262,  263, 
325  note,  343,  376. 


384 


INDEX 


Mill,   J.   S.,  10,  61,   132-133.  197  ff-. 

296,  326. 
Millionaires,  rights  of,  sacred,  375. 
Mind,  the  supreme,  96-97. 
Minority,  the  clever,  115. 
Mischief  of  false  theories,  368-369. 
Monogamy,  35,  231. 
Morley,  John,  192. 
Morris,  William,  255. 
Motive :     necessary    for    progression, 
152. 

actualises  faculties,  273. 

scope  of  loftier,  293  ff. 
Motive  power  of  evolutionary  process, 

96. 
Murger,  Henri,  341. 

Napoleon,  Spencer  and,  84-85. 
Nature  and  social  progress,  29. 
Needs,  human  wantsJiegin  as,  238. 
Newman,  Cardinal,  361. 

Oligarchy  :  compared  with  democracy, 
178. 
democracy  a  disguised,  187. 
Opinion:  popular,  requires  a  nucleus, 
187. 
origin  of  democratic,  222-223. 
Opportunity,  relativity  of,  349. 
Ordinary  man,  meaning  of  term,  251. 
Organisation  of  labour,  236. 

Past,  great  man's  debt  to  the,  71  fif. 
Permanence:  of  wage-system,  173. 

of    present    division    of    men    in 
classes,  348. 
Poets  not  great  men,  252. 
Political  economy,  new  position  of,  7. 
Politics:   great  man's  power  in,  176- 
177. 

supply  and  demand  in,  242. 
Popes  and  Councils,  227. 
Poverty,  socialism  said   to  be  protest 

of,  342. 
Power:  equality  of,  non-existent,  189. 

extent  of,  of  the  many,  190-191. 

limitation  of,  in  the  multitude,  372. 


Power  of  the  few  indestructible,  377. 
Powers,  inequality  in  natural,  1 18. 
Principles,  false,  concerning  education, 

347- 
Producers,  the  few  are  the  chief,  1 74- 

175- 
Production :     domain     of    economic, 

156. 

object  of,  238. 

producer's  right  to  his,  289. 
Progress  :  of  social  science,  9. 

great  man  a  true  cause  of,  83. 

fittest  survivor  and,  90. 

a  double  movement,  93. 

must  be  due  to  the  clever,  115. 

in  general,  130  ff. 

inventor  an  agent  of  social,  139. 

in  knowledge,  219. 

and  craftsmanship,  254-256. 

not  the  whole  of  life,  260-261. 
Protestantism,  226. 

"  Proximate  initiator  " :   Spencer  and 
the,  27,  63. 

Julius  Cffisar  as  a,  56. 

Reasoning:    Henry   George    and    de 
Lavelaye  employ  false,  19. 
analysis  of  practical,  208-211. 
Recompounding  of  family  groups,  36- 

37- 
Relations  of  classes  permanent,  376. 
Religion  and  average  man,  225. 
Representative,  guide  versus  the,  179. 
Results:  measure  of  greatness,  121. 

faculties  and,  2 1 3. 
Reward,  great  men  demand  a,  278. 
Rights:  socialists'  doctrine  of,  impos- 
sible, 367. 

of  the  few  and  the  many,  375. 
Rivalry :  of  existence,  89. 

of  great  men,  143. 

of  employers,  148-149. 
Road-making,  origin  of,  33. 
Rome,  Church  of,  and  democracy,  228- 

229. 
Rossi,  Giovanni,  232,  note. 
Rousseau,  J.  J.,  274. 


INDEX 


385 


Science  is  undergoing  a  change,  2. 
Sentimentalists  oppose  productive  ma- 
chines, 254. 
Shareholding    under    "  co-operative " 

system,  164. 
Skill  not  a  sign  of  greatness,  253-254. 
Slavery:  and  wage-system,  157. 

re-introduction  of,  impossible,  172. 
Slave-system,   socialism   essentially  a, 

165. 
Smith,  Adam,  32. 
Socialism:  a  slave-system,  165. 

competition  involved  in,  171. 
Socialists :  so-called  scientific,  53. 

and  inventions,  81. 

and  capital,  160. 

on  the  wage-system,  165  ff. 

errors  concerning  democracy,  215  ff. 

and  average  man,  262  ff, 

on  motive,  285-286,  304. 

on  investment,  319. 
Sociologists  and  social  science,  9  ff. 
Sociology:  success  of  speculative,  12- 
14. 

failure  of  practical,  15-16. 
Species,  Darwinian  theory  of,  96. 
Spencer,  Herbert :   11,  55  ff.,  215,  247, 
276,  280. 

exponent  of  a  fallacious  method,  24. 

his  sociological  works,  25. 

on  great  men,  26  ff. 

as  a  "  proximate  initiator,"  27. 

on  division  of  labour,  32. 

and  social  aggregate,  40  ff. 

ignores  the  individual,  45. 

on  great-man  theory,  50. 

on  the  military  leader,  57. 

as  an  industrial  dictator,  58  ff. 

on  social  inheritance,  77. 

and  Napoleon,  85. 

his  Social  Statics,  86. 

on  Sir  H.  Bessemer,  87. 

on  degrees  of  capacity,  113. 

and  the  clever  minority,  114-I15. 
Soldier,  work  of,  exceptional,  300-301. 
Starting-point  of  practical  sociologist, 
48. 


State :    and    advance    of  knowledge, 

138. 
to  supersede  private  employers,  165. 
care  of  children,  232. 
and  art  and  science,  275, 
and  education,  334. 
Strada,  Famiano,  104  and  note. 
Strikes,  369. 
Struggle  for  existence,  the  Darwinian, 

92. 
Struggle,  progressive,  limits  of,  147. 
"  Successfuls  and  unsuccessfuls,"  89. 
Superiority,  extent  of  great  man's,  68- 

69. 
Supply  dependent  on  the  few,  235. 
Survival  of  the  fittest :  monogamy  ex- 
ample of,  35. 
modern  sociology  adopts  doctrine 
of,  89. 

Talents:  some  are  abortive,  341-342. 

development  of,  346. 
Tastes,  development  of  needs,  238. 
Theocratic  theory,  25. 
Trade  unionism,  235  ff. 
Truisms :  speculative,  73. 

and  absurdities,  75. 

Unanimity  of  multitudes,  184-185. 

Voltaire,  comparison  of  Frederick  the 
Great  to,  121. 

Wage-payers  and  wage-earners,  169. 
Wage-system :  slavery  and,  157. 

permanent  nature  of,  172-173. 
Walter  press,  the,  result  of  unintended 

progress,  102-103. 
Wants,  needs,  and  tastes,  238. 
Wealth :  means  employed  in  produc- 
ing, 155-156. 

production  of,  and  greed,  288. 

desired  as  a  means,  306-307. 
Wealth  of  Nations^  32. 
Webb,  Sidney,  65,  73  ff.,  263,  280-281. 
Will,  intellect  and,  125, 
World,  every  class  its  own,  259. 


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second  part  is  entitled  Economics  in  Art.  Its  discussions  are  of  great  practical  value,  and 
are  tirnely,  touching  on  the  competitive  system,  cooperation  and  profit-sharing,  state  and 
municipal  ownership,  taxation,  the  eight-hour  day,  the  apprentice  system,  sweating  shops, 
the  labor  of  women  and  children,  the  unemployed,  the  currency,  etc.,  etc. 

Elementary  Economics. 

By  Herbert  J.  Davenport,  authorof"  Outlines  of  Economic  Theory."  $'.Zo,7tet. 
This  is  not  an  adaptation  for  school  purposes  of  Mr.  Davenport's  larger  work,  but  in  tl'.e 
main  a  new  book  both  in  matter  and  arrangement.  In  method  and  doctrine  it  follows  tnj 
"  Outlines"  in  some  degree.  The  same  attempt  is  made  to  lead  the  student  to  do  his  oiv.i 
thinking,  and  in  a  sense  the  method  is  inductive. 

An   introduction  to  Public  Finance. 

By  Prof.  Carl  C.  Plehn  (Univ.  of  Cal.).    i2mo.    ^1.60,  net. 

An  elementary  text-book  offeriiig  a  simple  outline  of  those  things  which  are  necessarv'  to 
prepare  the  student  for  independent  research  ;  a  brief  discussion  of  the  leading  principles 
that  are  generally  accepted  ;  a  statement  of  the  unsettled  principles,  with  the  grounds  of 
controversy;  and  sufficient  references  to  enable  the  student  to  form  some  opinion  for  himself. 


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66  FIFTH   AVENUE,   NEW   YORK. 


Valuable  Collateral  Reading 

IN 

ECONOMICS,  HISTORY,  ETC 


By  JAMES   BRYCE,  M.P.,  D.CL. 
The  American  Commonwealth  for  Students'  Use. 

Crown  8vo,  cloth.     $1.75,  net. 

Revised  by  Mr.  BRYCE,  with  the  assistance  of  Prof.  JESSE  MaCY,  of  Iowa  College. 
This  is  not  a  mere  condensation  of  the  larger  work,  but  a  restatement,  briefer 
and  in  a  form  more  carefully  adapted  to  use  as  a  text-book,  of  the  valuable 
material  in  Mr.  Bryce's  "American  Commonwealth,"  a  knowledge  of  which  is 
conceded  to  be  indispensable  to  any  one  who  would  acquire  a  just  estimate  of 
American  institutions. 

"  It  is  a  genuine  pleasure  to  commend  to  our  readers  the  abridged  edition  of  '  The  American 
Commonwealth'  just  issued  by  The  Macmillan  Company.  Mr.  Bryce's  book,  which  has 
heretofore  been  issued  only  in  two  volumes,  has  no  peer  as  a  commentary  upon  American 
political  institutions."  —  Public  Opinion. 

The  American  Commonwealth. 

2  vols.    Large  i2mo.    Third  edition.     Revised  throughout.    ^^4.00,  net. 

"  His  work  rises  at  once  to  an  eminent  place  among  studies  of  great  nations  and  their  insti- 
tutions. It  is,  so  far  as  America  goes,  a  work  unique  in  scope,  spirit,  and  knowledge.  There 
is  nothing  like  it  anywhere  extant  —  nothing  that  approaches  it.  .  .  .  Without  exaggeration, 
it  maybe  called  the  most  considerable  and  gratifying  tribute  that  has  yet  been  bestowed  upon 
us  by  an  Englishman,  and  perhaps  by  even  England  herself.  .  .  .  Every  thoughtful  Ameri- 
can will  read  it,  and  will  long  hold  in  grateful  remembrance  its  author's  name."  —  N'ew  York 
Times. 


A  Political  Primer  for  New  York  State  and  City. 

The  City  under  the  Greater  New  York  Charter.     By  Adele  M.  Fielde,  author  of 
"  A  Corner  of  Cathay."     With  maps.     Cloth,  75  cts.     Paper,  50  cts. 

Miss  Fielde  has  had  frequent  occasion  during  the  past  two  or  three  years  to  instruct  classes 
of  women  studying  political  questions.  Now  a  larger  class  seeks  her  instruction,  in  the  only 
way  open,  by  the  issue  of  this  clear,  concise,  yet  comprehensive  book. 


The  Study  of  City  Government. 

An  Outline  of  the  Problems  of  Municipal  Functions,  Control,  and  Organization. 
By  Delos  F.  Wilco.x,  A.M.,  Ph.D.     i2mo.     Cloth.     ^1.50,  net. 

The  author  holds  that  the  City  Problem  is  the  key  to  the  immediate  future  of  social  progress 
in  this  country,  and  he  offers  for  the  first  tim.e  a  systematic  outline  of  the  whole  municipal 
field,  indicating  the  chief  problems  of  function,  of  control,  and  of  organization. 


The  Finances  of  New  York  City. 

By  E.  Dana  Durand.    Cloth,  i2mo.    $2.00. 
A  well-written,  clear,  straightforward,  and  interesting  history  of  an  important  subject. 


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66  FIFTH   AVENUE,   NEW  YORK. 


This  book  is  DUE  on  the  last  date  stamped  helow 


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